fflBROSSLIBRARYi 


II 


LAKE    FOREST 
COLLEGE 


A 


GIFT  OF 


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THE  BROSS  LIBRARY 

The  Problem  of  the  Old  Testament,  by 

James  Orr,  D.D.    (Bross  Prize,  1905.) 

The  Mythical  Interpretation  of  the  Gos- 
pels, by  Thomas  Jambs  Thorburn,  D.D., 
LL.D.    (Bross  Prize,  igis) 

Faith  Justified  by  Progress,  by  H.  W. 
Wright,  Ph.D. 

The  Will  to  Freedom,  or  the  Gospel  of 
Nietzsche  and  the  Gospel  of  Christ,  by 

John    Neville     Figgis,     D.D.,    Litt.D. 
(/»  Press.) 

The  Bible:    Its    Origin  and    Nature,  by 

Marcus  Dods,  D.D. 

The  Bible  of  Nature,  by  J.  Arthur  Thom- 
son, M.A. 

The  Religions  of  Modern  Syria  and  Pales- 
tine,  by  Frederick  Jones  Bliss,  Ph.D. 

The  Sources  of  Religious  Insight,  by  Josiab 
RoYCE,  Ph.D.,  LL.D. 


THE  BROSS  LIBRARY 

VOLUME    IX 


THE  BROSS  LECTURES    ,    .    1916 

FAITH  JUSTIFIED   BY 
PROGRESS 


LECTURES  DELIVERED  BEFORE  LAKE  FOREST 

COLLEGE  ON  THE  FOUNDATION  OF  THE 

LATE  WILLIAM  BROSS 


BY 

HENRY  WILKES  WRIGHT,  Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR    OF    PHILOSOPHY    IN    LAKE    FOREST    COLLEGE 


NEW  YORK 

CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 

1916 


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Copyright,  1916,  by 
THE  TRUSTEES   OF   LAKE  FOREST  UNIVERSITY 


Published  October,  1916 


THE  BROSS  FOUNDATION 

The  Bross  Library  is  an  outgrowth  of 
a  fund  established  in  1879  by  the  late 
William  Bross,  Lieutenant-Governor  of  Il- 
linois from  1866  to  1870.  Desiring  some 
memorial  of  his  son,  Nathaniel  Bross,  who 
died  in  1856,  Mr.  Bross  entered  into  an 
agreement  with  the  "Trustees  of  Lake 
Forest  University,"  whereby  there  was 
finally  transferred  to  them  the  sum  of 
forty  thousand  dollars,  the  income  of  which 
was  to  accumulate  in  perpetuity  for  succes- 
sive periods  of  ten  years,  the  accumulation 
of  one  decade  to  be  spent  in  the  follow- 
ing decade,  for  the  purpose  of  stimulat- 
ing the  best  books  or  treatises  "on  the 
connection,  relation,  and  mutual  bearing 
of  any  practical  science,  the  history  of 
our  race,  or  the  facts  in  any  department 
of  knowledge,  with  and  upon  the  Chris- 


345350 


vi  THE  BROSS  FOUNDATION 

tian  Religion."  The  object  of  the  donor 
was  to  *'eall  out  the  best  efforts  of  the 
highest  talent  and  the  ripest  scholarship 
of  the  world  to  illustrate  from  science,  or 
from  any  department  of  knowledge,  and 
to  demonstrate  the  divine  origin  and  the 
authority  of  the  Christian  Scriptures;  and, 
further,  to  show  how  both  science  and 
revelation  coincide  and  prove  the  exist- 
ence, the  providence,  or  any  or  all  of 
the  attributes  of  the  only  living  and  true 
God,  'infinite,  eternal,  and  unchangeable 
in  His  being,  wisdom,  power,  holiness, 
justice,  goodness,  and  truth.'  " 

The  gift  contemplated  in  the  original 
agreement  of  1879  was  finally  consum- 
mated in  1890.  The  first  decade  of  the 
accumulation  of  interest  having  closed  in 
1900,  the  Trustees  of  the  Bross  Fund 
began  at  this  time  to  carry  out  the  pro- 
visions of  the  deed  of  gift.  It  was  de- 
termined to  give  the  general  title  of  "The 
Bross  Library"  to  the  series  of  books  pur- 
chased  and  published   with   the  proceeds 


THE  BROSS  FOUNDATION  vii 

of  the  Bross  Fund.  In  accordance  with 
the  express  wish  of  the  donor,  that  the 
"Evidences  of  Christianity"  of  his  "very- 
dear  friend  and  teacher,  Mark  Hopkins, 
D.D.,"  be  purchased  and  "ever  numbered 
and  known  as  No.  1  of  the  series,"  the 
Trustees  secured  the  copyright  of  this 
work,  which  has  been  repubHshed  in  a 
presentation  edition  as  Volume  I  of  the 
Bross  Library. 

The  trust  agreement  prescribed  two  meth- 
ods by  which  the  production  of  books  and 
treatises  of  the  nature  contemplated  by 
the  donor  was  to  be  stimulated: 

1.  The  Trustees  were  empowered  to  offer 
one  or  more  prizes  during  each  decade, 
the  competition  for  which  was  to  be  thrown 
open  to  "the  scientific  men,  the  Christian 
philosophers  and  historians  of  all  nations." 
In  accordance  with  this  provision,  a  prize 
of  $6,000  was  offered  in  1902  for  the  best 
book  fulfilling  the  conditions  of  the  deed 
of  gift,  the  competing  manuscripts  to  be 
presented  on  or  before  June  1,  1905.    The 


viii  THE   BROSS  FOUNDATION 

prize  was  awarded  to  the  late  Reverend 
James  Orr,  D.D.,  Professor  of  Apologetics 
and  Systematic  Theology  in  the  United 
Free  Church  College,  Glasgow,  for  his 
treatise  on  "The  Problem  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment," which  was  published  in  1906  as 
Volume  III  of  the  Bross  Library. 

The  second  Decennial  Prize  of  $6,000 
was  offered  in  1913,  the  competing  manu- 
scripts to  be  submitted  by  January  1,  1915. 
The  prize  was  awarded  by  the  judges  to  a 
manuscript  entitled  "The  Mythical  In- 
terpretation of  the  Gospels,"  by  the  Rev- 
erend Thomas  James  Thorburn,  D.D., 
LL.D.,  St.  Helen's  Down,  Hastings,  Eng- 
land. This  essay  was  published  in  1916 
as  Volume  VII  of  the  Bross  Library. 

The  next  Bross  Prize  will  be  offered 
about  1925,  and  will  be  announced  in  due 
time  by  the  Trustees  of  Lake  Forest  Uni- 
versity. 

2.  The  Trustees  were  also  empowered 
to  "select  and  designate  any  particular 
scientific    man    or    Christian    philosopher 


THE   BROSS  FOUNDATION  ix 

and  the  subject  on  which  he  shall  write/' 
and  to  "agree  with  him  as  to  the  sum  he 
shall  receive  for  the  book  or  treatise  to 
be  written."  Under  this  provision  the 
Trustees  have,  from  time  to  time,  invited 
eminent  scholars  to  deliver  courses  of  lec- 
tures before  Lake  Forest  College,  such 
courses  to  be  subsequently  pubUshed  as 
volumes  in  the  Bross  Library.  The  first 
course  of  lectures,  on  "Obligatory  Moral- 
ity," was  delivered  in  May,  1903,  by  the 
Reverend  Francis  Landey  Patton,  D.D., 
LL.D.,  then  President  of  Princeton  Theo- 
logical Seminary.  The  copyright  of  these 
lectures  is  now  the  property  of  the  Trustees 
of  the  Bross  Fund.  The  second  course  of 
lectures,  on  "The  Bible:  Its  Origin  and 
Nature,"  was  delivered  in  May,  1904,  by 
the  Reverend  Marcus  Dods,  D.D.,  Pro- 
fessor of  Exegetical  Theology  in  New  Col- 
lege, Edinburgh.  These  lectures  were  pub- 
lished in  1905  as  Volume  II  of  the  Bross 
Library.  The  third  course  of  lectures,  on 
"The  Bible  of  Nature,"  was  delivered  in 


X  THE   BROSS  FOUNDATION 

September  and  October,  1907,  by  Mr.  J. 
Arthur  Thomson,  M.A.,  Regius  Professor 
of  Natural  History  in  the  University  of 
Aberdeen.  These  lectures  were  pubHshed 
in  1908  as  Volume  IV  of  the  Bross  Library. 
The  fourth  course  of  lectures,  on  *'The 
ReUgions  of  Modern  Syria  and  Palestine," 
was  delivered  in  November  and  December, 
1908,  by  Frederick  Jones  BUss,  Ph.D.,  of 
Beirut,  Syria.  These  lectures  were  pub- 
lished in  1912  as  Volume  V  of  the  Bross 
Library.  The  fifth  course  of  lectures,  on 
"The  Sources  of  Religious  Insight,"  was 
delivered  in  November,  1911,  by  Professor 
Josiah  Royce,  Ph.D.,  of  Harvard  Uni- 
versity. These  lectures  were  published 
in  1912  as  Volume  VI  of  the  Bross  Library. 
The  sixth  course  of  lectures,  on  "The  Will 
to  Freedom,  or  the  Gospel  of  Nietzsche 
and  the  Gospel  of  Christ,"  was  delivered 
in  May,  1915,  by  the  Reverend  J.  Ne- 
ville Figgis,  D.D.,  Litt.D.,  of  the  House 
of  the  Resurrection,  Mirfield,  England. 
These  lectures  will  be  published  as  Volume 


THE   BROSS  FOUNDATION  xi 

VIII  of  the  Bross  Library.  The  seventh 
course  of  lectures,  on  "Faith  Justified  by 
Progress,"  was  deUvered  in  April  and  May, 
1916.  These  lectures  are  embodied  in  the 
present  volume. 

John  Scholte  Nollen, 
President,  Lake  Forest  College. 

Lake  Forest,  Illinois, 
June,  1916. 


PREFACE 

In  this  essay  I  make  no  attempt  to  give 
an  adequate  account  of  the  course  of 
social  evolution  or  to  trace  in  detail  the 
development  of  the  religious  conscious- 
ness. Least  of  all  is  it  my  purpose  to 
take  up  the  problem  of  origins,  either  as 
pertaining  to  social  organization  generally 
or  with  reference  to  religious  belief  in 
particular.  Rather,  my  aim  is  to  describe 
certain  types  of  social  life  important  enough 
to  be  regarded  as  leading  stages  in  social 
or  moral  evolution,  and  to  find  out  if 
possible  the  part  played  by  reUgious  faith 
in  each  one.  The  forms  and  features  of 
human  society  to  which  reference  is  made 
are  too  well  known  to  need  illustration 
from  sources,  historical  or  ethnological; 
such  citations  would,  in  my  judgment, 
only  distract  the  attention  of  the  reader 

xiii 


XIV  PREFACE 

from  the  main  interest  of  the  essay,  which 
is  that  of  interpretation.  A  study  of  the 
functions  discharged  by  rehgious  faith  in 
the  leading  stages  of  social  life  must,  I 
believe,  throw  light  upon  the  essential 
nature  of  religion;  it  will  also  suggest,  I 
hope,  the  work  which  religion  has  still  to 
accomplish  in  the  advance  of  civilization. 
Such  hope  has  been  the  inspiration  of  this 
writing. 

Henry  Wilkes  Wright. 

Lake  Forest,  Illinois, 
June  26,  1916. 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 


Introduction  :  The  Rise  of  Natural- 
ism AND  THE  Eclipse  of  Faith       .  1 

I.    The   Will  as  the  True  Source  of 

Human  Progress 45 

II.    The  Primitive  Life 59 

III.  The  Natural  Life 87 

IV.  The  Supernatural  Life      ....  130 
V.    The  Universal  Life 197 

Postscript  :  The  Future  of  Religion  262 

Index 285 


INTRODUCTION 

THE  RISE  OF  NATURALISM  AND  THE 
ECLIPSE  OF  FAITH 

Faith  we  shall  here  understand  as  be- 
lief that  the  ideals  of  personal  life  can  be 
realized,  a  belief  which  is  affirmed  and 
acted  upon  in  advance  of  proof  from  ac- 
tual experience.  Like  all  attempts  to  ex- 
press in  verbal  formula  a  familiar  mental 
state,  this  definition  is  somewhat  arbitrary 
and  will  probably  meet  objection.  To 
some  it  may  seem  to  broaden  unduly  the 
province  of  faith;  to  others  it  will  appear 
in  just  as  unwarranted  a  way  to  restrict 
the  range  of  faith's  activity.  A  critic  of 
the  first  class  would  undoubtedly  assert 
that  our  definition  so  enlarged  the  mean- 
ing of  faith  as  to  make  it  identical  with 
religion  itself — and  morality  as  well.  For 
what,  he  would  ask,  is  religion  in  essence 

but  such  an  attitude  of  confidence  in  the 

1 


;V  ; 2. «.;*..   R4ITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

ultimate  reality,  confidence,  that  is,  that 
the  real  universe  provides  for  the  final 
satisfaction  of  personality?  The  truth  of 
this  assertion  is  freely  admitted,  but  we 
refuse  to  find  in  it  any  objection  to  the 
conception  of  faith  which  we  propose  to 
adopt.  For  a  philosophical  study  of  the 
meaning  and  implications  of  faith  proves 
it  to  be  this  very  thing,  the  essence  of 
morality  and  of  religion  as  well.  The 
second  objection  is  of  opposite  tenor  and 
will  come  from  those  who  are  unwilling 
to  restrict  the  action  of  faith  to  the  moral 
and  religious  spheres.  Are  not,  they  will 
ask,  the  confidence  of  the  business  man 
in  the  economic  soundness  and  eventual 
prosperity  of  his  country  and  that  of 
the  ambitious  youth  in  his  own  powers 
to  achieve  professional  success  and  re- 
nown genuine  cases  of  faith  .^  In  so  far 
as  the  confidence,  in  these  two  instances 
and  many  others  that  might  be  cited  from 
diflFerent  fields  of  conduct,  is  a  sincere 
belief  in  the  powers  of  personality  to  ac- 


INTRODUCTION  3 

complish  its  purposes,  they  assuredly  are. 
But  in  this  instance,  we  should  hold,  they 
are  but  particular  and  partial  expressions 
of  that  underlying  confidence  that  the 
ends  of  self-conscious  personality  can  be 
realized,  which  may  rightfully  claim  recogni- 
tion as  the  primary  and  fundamental  faith. 
If  we  thus  conceive  of  faith  as  the  con- 
fidence of  human  personality  that  the  real 
world  permits  of  its  continued  develop- 
ment and  final  satisfaction,  it  is  obvious 
that  we  cannot  with  correctness  contrast 
certain  epochs  or  periods  of  human  history 
as  possessing  faith  with  others  as  lacking 
it.  Without  some  measure  of  confidence 
in  the  power  of  his  own  will  to  accomplish 
its  proper  purposes,  man  could  not  con- 
tinue to  exist  at  all;  certainly  no  social 
order  could  survive  and  make  its  contribu- 
tion to  human  civilization.  But  the  con- 
fidence in  question  may  be  more  explicitly 
avowed  and  constantly  reflected  on  in 
one  age  than  in  another.  So  in  historic 
fact  it  was  in  the  Middle  Ages;   hence  not 


4  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

inappropriately  the  mediaeval  period  has 
been  called  the  age  of  faith.  The  absorbing 
intellectual  interest  of  this  period  was  hu- 
man salvation,  the  preservation  of  man's 
soul  in  its  essence  and  integrity  from  all 
the  corrupting  and  destroying  influences  of 
the  material  world.  Such  conservation  of 
human  personality,  despaired  of  in  the 
deepening  gloom  that  attended  the  close 
of  the  ancient  era,  mediaeval  thought  con- 
fidently and  joyfully  believed  had  been 
secured  through  the  divine  plan  of  redemp- 
tion. This  divine  redemptive  plan  became 
consequently  the  ceaseless  preoccupation 
of  men's  minds  in  this  period;  it  was  for 
them  the  one  end  toward  which  the  whole 
creation  moved.  With  reference  to  this 
one  end  of  man's  salvation  through  the 
divine  redemptive  process,  they  interpreted 
all  the  facts  of  human  experience.  The 
one  purpose  of  their  thinking  was  to  for- 
mulate, clearly  and  exhaustively,  the  Chris- 
tian plan  of  salvation,  and  then  to  dis- 
cover how  the  events  of  human  history 


INTRODUCTION  5 

and  the  objects  and  creatures  of  the  ma- 
terial world  contributed  as  means  to  the 
furtherance  of  this  sublime  end.  Thus 
in  dealing  with  natural  phenomena,  it 
knew  but  one  method  of  interpretation, 
the  teleological:  the  existence  of  objects 
was  explained  by  showing  the  moral  or 
religious  purpose  they  subserved.  To  un- 
dertake such  a  detailed  description  and 
classification  of  existing  objects  as  con- 
stitutes the  foundation  of  modern  science, 
it  had  not  the  slightest  inclination;  it  had 
little  or  no  interest  in  the  natural  world 
for  its  own  sake  or  in  the  relation  of 
natural  objects  among  themselves.  Hence 
the  thought  of  this  period  sought  to  ex- 
plain the  existence  of  objects,  not  by  show- 
ing their  natural  causes,  but  by  searching 
out  the  uses  which  they  had  for  man,  and 
particularly  their  value  for  man's  spiritual 
edification.  And  when  by  no  effort  of 
the  imagination  it  was  possible  to  con- 
nect an  object  or  event  with  the  divine 
plan  for  human  salvation,  it  was  treated 


6  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

as  a  symbol,  a  divinely  prepared  lesson  of 
spiritual  truth.  To  the  natural  world 
apart  from  these  supposed  spiritual  uses 
the  mediaeval  attitude  was  one  of  dis- 
dainful indifiference:  it  was  not  worth  the 
time  and  trouble  required  for  its  patient 
and  thorough  study.  Little  wonder  that 
modern  science  has  shown  an  antagonism 
to  such  teleology  so  bitter  and  relentless 
as  to  seem,  in  this  day  of  general  toleration 
unreasonable!  Teleology  of  this  kind  rep- 
resents not  merely  a  method  diflFerent  from, 
and  opposed  to,  the  causal  investigation 
of  nature;  it  represents  the  depreciation 
and  denial  of  all  natural  science  whatso- 
ever. 

In  the  course  of  time,  mediaeval  thought 
developed  a  fairly  complete  world-view. 
This  world-view  was  borrowed  from  sev- 
eral sources,  its  constituent  features  being 
selected  because  of  their  harmony  with 
the  ruhng  preconception  of  the  period. 
Its  cosmogony  was  derived  from  a  literal 
interpretation  of  the  first  chapters  of  Gene- 


INTRODUCTION  7 

sis.  The  world  was  created  by  God  out 
of  nothing  in  six  Hteral  days,  designed  by 
the  divine  will  to  be  the  home  of  man,  and 
every  other  living  thing  was  also  separately 
created  and  likewise  designed  to  serve  him 
who  bore  God's  image.  Its  astronomy  was 
taken  from  the  ancient  system  of  Ptolemy. 
The  earth  was  the  centre  of  the  universe: 
the  heavenly  bodies,  sun,  moon,  and  stars, 
revolved  round  the  earth,  giving  man  the 
heat  and  Ught  he  needed  by  day  and  by 
night.  The  physics  of  Aristotle  was  ad- 
mirably suited  to  complete  this  concep- 
tion of  the  physical  universe.  The  earth 
was  the  seat  of  imperfect  motion,  hence 
the  scene  of  change  and  decay.  Motion 
becomes  less  variable  and  more  perfect  as 
the  spheres  succeed  one  another  until  the 
outermost  is  reached,  where  motion  is  per- 
fect and  eternally  the  same.  This  outer- 
most sphere  is  the  heaven  of  heavens,  the 
abode  of  deity.  This  world-scheme  of  the 
mediaeval  mind,  had  two  striking  merits: 
it  agreed  both  with  the  demands  of  man's 


8  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

spiritual  welfare  as  he  then  understood 
them  and  also  with  the  facts  as  they  ap- 
peared to  sense-perception. 

The  modern  world  has  largely  lost  that 
faith  which  possessed  and  inspired  the 
mediaeval  mind.  Our  loss  of  faith  is  to  a 
considerable  extent  due  to  the  fact  that 
the  advance  of  knowledge  has  compelled 
modern  thought  to  abandon  the  mediaeval 
world-view.  Modern  science  has  given  us 
in  its  place  the  universe  of  natural  law,  a 
universe  in  which  it  is  far  more  diflScult 
to  find  any  provision  for  man's  continued 
personal  development  and  ultimate  sal- 
vation. In  the  formation  of  the  modern 
scientific  world-view  the  first  and  perhaps 
the  most  important  step  was  the  discovery 
by  Copernicus  that  the  sun  and  not  the 
earth  was  the  centre  of  the  solar  system, 
that  the  earth  was,  in  fact,  but  one  of  a 
number  of  satellites,  moving  around  the 
sun  and  revolving  upon  its  own  axis  as 
well.  We  have  become  so  famiHar  with 
these  ideas,  the  very  A  B  C  of  astronomical 


INTRODUCTION  9 

science,  that  we  may  altogether  fail  to  ap- 
preciate their  revolutionary  import  for  hu- 
man thought.  We  cannot  understand  why 
they  aroused  such  a  fury  of  opposition 
among  churchmen,  Catholic  and  Protestant 
alike.  But  when  once  we  grasp  the  signifi- 
cance of  the  change  which  the  Copernican 
astronomy  wrought  in  man's  conception 
of  his  world  we  no  longer  wonder  that  the 
Church  combated  it  with  such  unrestrained 
violence,  with  such  desperate  earnestness; 
for  the  belief  that  man's  salvation  through 
the  divinely  appointed  plan  is  the  end  for 
which  the  whole  world  exists  seems  to  re- 
quire as  its  logical  consequence  the  further 
behef  that  the  earth,  the  stage  on  which 
this  tremendous  drama  of  man's  fall  and 
redemption  is  enacted,  is  the  centre  of  the 
universe.  Everything  else,  the  whole  choir 
of  heaven,  sun,  moon,  and  stars,  is  reduced 
to  the  position  of  mere  stage-setting,  is 
made  accessory  and  subsidiary  to  human 
concerns.  But  what  a  different  position 
does  modern  astronomy  assign  to  the  earth 


10  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

in  relation  to  the  rest  of  the  physical  uni- 
verse !  It  has  not  even  the  importance  of 
a  star;  it  is  only  a  satelHte  of  what  Laf- 
cadio  Hearn  calls  a  "tenth-rate  yellow 
sun,"  a  sun  like  which  there  are  countless 
others  among  the  host  of  stars.  Such  then 
is  the  home  of  man,  and  the  race  of  man 
itself  but  a  swarm  of  living  beings  inhabit- 
ing the  surface  of  such  a  planet  as  it  swings 
on  its  orbit;  his  position  in  the  universal 
system  is  thus  one  of  utter  insignificance. 
Ought  we  then  to  feel  surprise  when  we 
read  that  in  1631  a  Roman  Catholic  prelate 
declared:  "The  opinion  of  the  earth's  mo- 
tion is  of  all  heresies  the  most  abominable, 
the  most  pernicious,  the  most  scandalous; 
the  immutabihty  of  the  earth  is  thrice 
sacred;  argument  against  the  immortality 
of  the  soul,  the  existence  of  God,  and  the 
incarnation  should  be  tolerated  sooner 
than  an  argument  that  the  earth  moves".f^ 
The  world  of  mediaeval  thought  was  a 
world  small  enough  for  man  to  feel  at  home 
in.     If  not  itself  man's  spiritual   home,  it 


INTRODUCTION  11 

was  so  arranged  as  to  enable  man  to  get 
his  spiritual  bearings:  for  was  not  heaven 
itself  located  at  the  outermost  stellar 
sphere?  The  world  of  modern  astronomy- 
is  a  lonesome,  an  awesome,  an  inhuman 
sort  of  place  where  are  furnaces  of  heat  so 
intense  that  one  faint  breath  would  suffice 
to  consume  every  living  creature  of  earth, 
and  frozen  solitudes  immeasurably  vast 
through  which  go  hurtling  masses  of  mat- 
ter able  on  collision  to  shatter  our  earth  to 
dust.  In  such  a  universe,  infinitely  ex- 
tended in  space  and  time,  man's  life,  the 
whole  course  of  his  history  upon  earth 
seems  but  the  merest  flicker  destined  to 
leave,  even  in  the  place  of  its  occurrence, 
scarcely  a  trace. 

Soon  after  Copernicus  made  his  startling 
discovery  that  the  earth  moves  around 
the  sun,  Kepler  discovered  that  the  dis- 
tribution and  orbits  of  the  planets  agree 
with  the  forms  and  principles  of  geometry, 
showing  that  the  path  of  planetary  revolu- 
tion is  an  ellipse  and  that  the  laws  of  plane- 


12         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

tary  motion  are  based  upon  this  figure. 
This  remarkable  demonstration  that  the 
physical  world  was  ordered  in  definite 
quantitative  relations  served  both  to  es- 
tablish the  Copernican  astronomy  and  to 
add  one  more  stone  to  the  foundation  of 
the  modern  mechanical  world-view.  In 
the  seventeenth  century  Newton  completed 
the  work  of  Kepler  by  showing  that  the 
direction  and  velocity  of  planetary  motion 
were  instances  of  a  still  more  fundamental 
quantitative  uniformity  which  held  of  all 
motion  of  all  bodies  in  the  physical  world. 
Thus  it  was  the  privilege  of  Newton,  work- 
ing in  ground  already  prepared  by  Galileo, 
to  complete  the  foundations  of  modern 
physics;  for  the  verification  of  the  gravi- 
tation formula  that  every  particle  or  atom 
or  body  in  the  universe  attracts  every 
other  with  a  force  proportional  to  their 
masses  taken  conjointly,  and  inversely  pro- 
portional to  the  square  of  their  distances 
apart,  meant  that  the  mechanical  laws 
which   hold   good   on   the   surface   of   the 


INTRODUCTION  13 

earth  were  valid  throughout  the  universe; 
that,  in  short,  the  physical  universe  was 
a  huge  machine. 

By  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
attempts  were  being  made  to  complete  the 
mechanical  world-system  which  had  been 
so  rapidly  and  securely  established.  To 
accomplish  this  it  was  necessary  to  ex- 
plain the  origin  of  the  natural  world  by 
the  same  mechanical  principles  that  were 
shown  to  control  its  operation,  and  to  ac- 
count for  the  birth  and  development  of 
life  and  of  mind  in  terms  of  mechanical 
causation.  This  the  philosopher  Kant  at- 
tempted to  do.  Being  desirous  of  proving 
that  the  divine  interference  which  Newton 
believed  was  required  to  account  for  the 
origin  of  the  world-machine  could  be  dis- 
pensed with,  Kant  in  an  early  work,  The 
General  History  of  Nature  and  Theory  of 
the  Heavens  (1755),  tried  to  show  that  the 
origin  of  the  physical  universe  could  be 
explained  according  to  mechanical  law, 
and,  to  this  end,  formulated  a  theory  of 


14          FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

world-origin  which  anticipates  in  a  remark- 
able fashion  the  essential  features  of  the 
nebular  hypothesis,  later  proposed  by  La- 
place and  generally  adopted.  In  other  works 
which  also  fall  within  the  earlier  period  of 
his  intellectual  career,  Kant  endeavored  to 
explain  the  origin,  growth,  and  differentia- 
tion of  living  beings  by  natural  causes, 
holding  that  all  higher  forms  may  be 
traced  back  to  simpler  elementary  forms, 
and  that  present  differences  in  species  are 
due  to  the  direct  influence  of  changing  ex- 
ternal conditions,  such  as  climate,  food, 
etc.  Not  even  man  would  he  exempt  from 
the  mechanical  system,  but  he  proposed  to 
account  for  his  origin  and  development  by 
the  same  natural  causes.  Kant's  attempt 
thus  to  make  mechanism  universal  proved 
to  be  premature,  however;  he  himself 
abandoned  it  and  withdrew  to  a  more 
conservative  position  in  later  life.  Over- 
zealous  partisans  of  natural  science  have 
attributed  Kant's  abandonment  of  his 
earlier  evolutionism  to  the  conservatism  of 


.       INTRODUCTION  15 

advancing  age  reinforced  by  a  reluctance 
to  break  completely  with  the  traditional 
theology.  But  such  charges  are  quite  un- 
justified; the  reasons  which  determined 
Kant  thus  to  change  his  view  were  the 
very  same  which  influenced  great  natural- 
ists Uke  Buffon  in  the  closing  decade  of 
the  eighteenth  century  to  abandon  all  be- 
lief in  organic  evolution  and  hold  fast  to 
special  creation.  These  reasons  were  fur- 
nished by  the  forms  and  structures  of  the 
living  organism  itself,  as  those  were  at  that 
time  being  discovered  and  described  through 
microscopical  investigation  and  systematic 
research.  Such  scientific  study  served  only 
to  set  in  clearer  light  the  marvellous  adap- 
tations characteristic  of  life  and  living 
creatures,  adaptations  of  species  to  their 
environment,  and  of  organs  and  structures 
to  their  function  and  use.  To  account  for 
such  beautifully  contrived,  for  such  finely 
adjusted  structures,  no  natural  cause  suf- 
ficed; before  them  mechanism  was  dumb; 
outside  the  province  of  physical  law  they 


16          FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

seemed  destined  to  remain,  as  living  wit- 
nesses to  the  contriving  skill  of  divine  in- 
telligence. To  such  a  compromise  Kant 
finally  came:  the  inorganic  world  he  be- 
lieved capable  of  thoroughgoing  mechan- 
ical formulation,  but  the  organic  world,  he 
thought,  could  be  explained  only  in  terms 
of  creative  purpose. 

Nearly  a  century  elapsed  before  Dar- 
win, master-mind  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, as  Kant  was  of  the  eighteenth,  re- 
moved this  last  great  obstacle  to  the 
extension  of  natural  law  by  bringing  the 
realm  of  life  within  the  domain  of  physical 
causation.  Darwin's  achievement  was  two- 
fold. In  the  first  place,  he  assembled  and 
arranged  a  mass  of  evidence,  in  cumulative 
effect  fairly  convincing,  that  the  different 
forms  of  life  now  existent  owe  their  origin 
not  to  so  many  creative  acts  of  Deity  but 
to  a  natural  process  of  development.  Sec- 
ondly, he  made  the  discovery,  of  which 
Kant  despaired,  of  a  natural  cause  or  proc- 
ess able  to  account  for  the  existence  of 


INTRODUCTION  17 

those  organic  structures  which,  because 
plainly  adapted  as  means  to  the  fulfilment 
of  an  end,  we  are  naturally  disposed  to 
refer  to  the  work  of  a  designing  intelligence. 
Of  these  two  achievements  perhaps  the 
second  was  the  more  notable;  for,  until 
a  natural  cause  could  be  imagined  and 
verified  able  to  produce  these  purposive 
structures,  human  thought  would  be  justi- 
fied in  holding  to  an  exclusively  teleolog- 
ical  explanation  of  their  origin.  But,  as 
we  are  aware,  Darwin  showed  that,  given 
the  constant  occurrence  in  living  forms  of 
minute  variations  that  are  inherited,  then, 
in  the  struggle  to  exist  which  follows  from 
the  rapid  rate  of  multiplication  of  such 
living  beings,  those  variations  which  best 
fit  the  organism  to  Hve  and  prosper  in  its 
environment  will  be  preserved  and  trans- 
mitted, while  all  others  will  be  eliminated. 
As  the  result  of  these  causes,  variations 
are  accumulated  along  those  lines  which 
adapt  the  organism  to  exist  and  survive; 
thus,  gradually,  the   complicated   adapta- 


18  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

tions  of  living  tissue,  at  which  we  marvel, 
take  their  rise.  Of  late  years  there  has 
been  some  talk  among  scientists  of  the 
decline  and  even  of  the  "death"  of  "Dar- 
winism," and  from  this  some  anxious  spirits 
have  derived  consolation,  thinking  that  it 
means  the  abandonment  by  science  of  the 
evolution  theory.  But  when  such  state- 
ments are  made  by  persons  competent  to 
judge,  the  Darwinism  referred  to  is  the 
view  that  natural  selection  is  the  all-suf- 
ficient cause  of  organic  evolution.  This 
latter  was  not  even  the  view  of  Darwin 
himself,  but  of  some  of  his  followers,  par- 
ticularly those  influenced  by  Wallace  and 
Weismann.  Darwin  in  later  years  came 
more  and  more  to  doubt  the  adequacy  of 
natural  selection  to  explain  all  the  facts, 
and  found  himself  assigning  a  constantly 
increasing  importance  to  such  other  fac- 
tors as  use  and  disuse  and  the  direct 
action  of  the  environment.  In  a  letter 
written  late  in  life  he  confesses  with  char- 
acteristic candor  to  his  chagrin  over  this 


INTRODUCTION  19 

fact  because  it  diminished  the  credit  due 
to  natural  selection,  the  factor  which  he 
had  discovered  and  which  was  destined  to 
be  identified  forever  with  his  name. 

The  latter  half  of  the  nineteenth  century- 
saw  the  scientific  world-view  in  its  main 
outlines  completed.  The  natural  sciences, 
brought  into  correlation  by  the  compre- 
hensive principle  of  evolution,  conceived 
of  the  universe  as  a  system  whose  parts 
are  determined  not  by  an  overruKngintel- 
ligence  but  by  resident  forces  which  act 
and  react  with  mechanical  uniformity.  As 
this  world-view  gained  influence  over  men's 
minds  and  won  increasing  acceptance  in 
intelligent  circles  of  modern  society,  it 
weakened  faith  and  threatened  to  de- 
stroy it  altogether;  for  such  a  universe 
as  evolutionary  science  depicted  seemed 
itself  to  demonstrate  the  futility  of  faith. 
Belief  that  the  ideals  of  personal  life  can 
be  realized  is  rational  only  if  such  realiza- 
tion is  a  possibiHty.  '  But  man's  personal 
development  requires  that  he  be  able  to 


20         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

choose  his  ideal,  to  plan  the  steps  in  its 
realization,  to  subject  natural  objects  and 
forces  to  the  achievement  of  his  purpose, 
and  finally  to  experience  the  satisfaction 
of  its  realization.  This  in  its  turn  im- 
plies, on  man's  side,  freedom,  initiative, 
and  personal  permanence;  on  the  side  of 
nature,  the  capacity  to  respond  to  new 
forces  and  to  enter  into  new  relations. 
But  how  is  this  possible  in  a  mechanically 
determined  system  .^^  The  same  machinery 
which  in  its  regular  workings  struck  ofif 
the  spark  of  man's  soul  must  in  a  short 
time  extinguish  it,  and  that  little  corner  of 
the  universe  which  for  a  brief  while  knew 
man  and  his  busy  pretensions  would  know 
him  no  more.  This  effect  of  modern  nat- 
uralism in  destroying  man's  faith  in  his 
own  personal  ideals  and  his  own  spiritual 
destiny,  Huxley  describes  in  a  passage  be- 
come classic:  "The  consciousness  of  this 
great  truth"  ("the  extension  of  matter 
and  causation  and  the  concomitant  banish- 
ment of  spirit  and  spontaneity")  "weighs 


INTRODUCTION  21 

like  a  nightmare  upon  many  of  the  best 
minds  of  these  days.  They  watch  what 
they  conceive  to  be  the  progress  of  ma- 
teriaUsm  in  such  fear  and  powerless  anger 
as  a  savage  feels  when  during  an  eclipse 
the  great  shadow  creeps  over  the  face  of 
the  sun.  The  advancing  tide  of  matter 
threatens  to  drown  their  souls,  the  tight- 
ening grasp  of  law  impedes  their  free- 
dom." 

Modern  philosophy,  however,  has  found 
new  grounds  for  the  faith  which  the  ad- 
vancing shadow  of  naturalism  threatened 
totally  to  eclipse,  and  these  grounds  he 
in  the  method  and  presuppositions  of  ex- 
perimental science  itself.  It  was  then  no 
accident  that  turned  the  attention  of  phi- 
losophers in  modern  times  to  the  processes 
and  problems  of  knowledge:  the  facts  of 
epistemology  were  just  the  counterbalance 
needed  to  offset  the  sweeping  conclusions 
of  science  and  prepare  the  way  for  a  truly 
synthetic  view.  These  epistemological 
studies  of  early  modern  philosophers  cul- 


22         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

minated  in  the  epoch-making  insight  of 
the  philosopher  Kant  which  brought  about 
what  he  Kked  to  call  a  Copernican  revolu- 
tion in  the  science  of  knowledge.  Now 
Kant  was  not  only  a  student  of  philo- 
sophical problems;  he  was  well  versed  in 
modern  science  and  had  given  special  at- 
tention to  the  Newtonian  mechanics.  New- 
ton's system  made  a  deep  impression  upon 
him:  from  its  study  he  gained  that  insight 
which  is  fundamental  to  his  system;  for 
Kant  was  the  first  to  apprehend  in  its  real 
significance  the  fact  that  the  sciences  of 
mathematics  and  physics  are  not  accumu- 
lations of  sense-facts,  but  instead  are  gen- 
uine intellectual  constructions,  as  truly 
creations  of  the  mind  of  the  scientist  as  a 
national  policy  or  an  epic  poem  are  crea- 
tions of  the  mind  of  statesman  or  poet.  In 
order  to  bring  out  the  importance  of  this 
fundamental  insight  of  Kant's  we  must 
at  this  juncture  advert  to  certain  considera- 
tions which  digress  slightly  from  the  main 
line  of  our  thought. 


INTRODUCTION  23 

Every  view  or  conception  of  the  world, 
including,  of  course,  the  mechanical,  which 
pretends  to  be  universal  in  its  scope,  must 
furnish  explanation  for  its  own  existence 
as  a  system  of  thought.  For  the  human 
thinker  and  his  thought  are  a  part  of  the 
real  world  and  one  who  would  explain  the 
universe  in  terms  of  mechanism  must  find 
mechanical  causes  and  processes  able  to 
account  for  them  both.  Now  if,  for  the 
moment,  the  graver  difficulty  be  ignored 
of  introducing  consciousness  into  the  sys- 
tem of  physical  energy,  we  may  admit 
that  we  should  have  at  least  the  semblance 
of  a  mechanical  explanation  of  thinking 
if  we  could  conceive  of,  say,  scientific 
generalization  as  the  accumulation  of  im- 
pressions of  a  certain  kind,  made  upon 
the  mind  by  a  particular  object  or  set  of 
objects,  event  or  sequence  of  events,  which 
repeatedly  stimulated  the  sense-organs. 
Thus  we  should  have  at  least  the  sugges- 
tion of  an  explanation  of  thinking  in  terms 
of   natural   causation.      Now,   this  is  the 


24         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

way  in  which  many  persons,  and  frequently 
the  scientific  investigators  themselves  who 
are  actively  engaged  in  the  process,  tend 
to  understand  scientific  induction.  From 
the  observation  of  similar  instances  and 
an  accumulation  of  particular  facts,  the 
generalization  is  supposed  to  arise  by  a 
kind  of  natural  law.  Bacon,  the  reputed 
founder  of  the  inductive  method,  may 
seem  occasionally  to  give  sanction  to  this 
view,  but  Galileo  had  a  more  adequate 
understanding  of  the  process.  The  truth 
is  that  a  scientific  induction  is  a  creation 
of  active  intelligence:  the  laws  induced 
are  not  conscious  reflections  of  the  total 
effect  of  many  external  agencies  working 
upon  the  sense-organs,  they  are  in  a  true 
sense  original  constructions  of  the  mind 
itseK.  Working  on  the  basis  of  observed 
fact,  the  scientific  investigator  by  the 
exercise  of  his  constructive  imagination 
formulates  an  hypothesis,  and  this  he  is 
able  to  do  because  of  the  power  his  mind 
possesses  of  projecting  motions  and  con- 


INTRODUCTION  25 

ceiving  relations  in  pure  space,  indepen- 
dent of  actual  observation.  The  hypothesis 
once  constructed,  the  intelUgence  of  the 
originator,  guided  by  its  intuitive  grasp  of 
the  logic  of  space  and  of  meaning,  proceeds 
to  deduce  the  particular  consequences  which 
will  follow  in  fact  if  the  hypothesis  is  true. 
In  this  fashion  all  the  great  inductions  of 
modern  science,  those  of  Copernicus  and 
Kepler,  of  GaHleo  and  Newton  and  Dar- 
win, have  arisen;  as  such  they  are  standing 
refutations  of  the  mechanical  conception  of 
the  universe. 

Kant  rendered  modern  thought  a  high 
service,  therefore,  when  he  showed  that 
the  laws  of  natural  science  are  intellectual 
constructions,  that  mathematics  and  physics 
in  particular  are  not  assemblages  of  facts 
but  elaborately  wrought-out  conceptual  sys- 
tems. But,  we  are  tempted  at  once  to 
ask,  do  we  not,  when  we  thus  speak  of 
the  laws  of  nature  as  constructions  of 
imaginative  intelligence,  neglect  their  dis- 
tinguishing feature,  their  outstanding  char- 


26         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

acteristic?  We  are  familiar  with  the  prod- 
ucts of  the  imagination  in  other  fields. 
The  novelist,  for  example,  through  the 
exercise  of  his  imagination  creates  a  group 
of  characters,  fills  in  every  important  de- 
tail of  their  appearance,  dress,  and  situa- 
tion, records  every  significant  act  and  in- 
cident of  their  life  histories,  and  all  with 
such  consistency  and  lifelikeness  that  we 
say  his  story  is  truer  than  fact.  For  all 
that,  because  the  story  is  a  work  of  imag- 
ination and  not  a  narration  of  actual  oc- 
currences, we  assign  it  to  the  realm  of  fic- 
tion rather  than  the  domain  of  fact.  On 
the  other  hand,  is  not  the  salient  feature 
of  a  scientific  law  its  standing  as  objective 
fact,  in  diametrical  opposition  to  all  that 
is  subjective  and  fictitious  .^^  Does  it  not 
express  a  uniformity  in  the  operation  of 
real  forces,  an  underlying  uniformity  and 
hence  a  basal  fact?  The  question  arises, 
then,  how  such  a  generalization,  admittedly 
the  creation  of  human  intelligence,  ac- 
quires the  standing  of  objective  fact.    This 


INTRODUCTION  27 

was  Kant's  great  problem.  His  solution 
was  that  such  principles  and  products  of 
our  thinking  gain  objectivity  from  the 
work  they  do  in  making  more  orderly, 
more  harmonious,  more  unified,  the  world 
of  our  common  human  experience.  For, 
he  held,  the  difference  between  the  objec- 
tive world  and  any  realm  of  fiction  or  of 
fancy  is  that  the  elements  of  the  former 
are  so  bound  together  in  fixed  order  and 
relationship  as  to  constitute  one  system, 
the  same  for  all  human  minds. 

Kant's  answer  is  undoubtedly  true  as 
far  as  it  goes,  profoundly  and  indubitably 
true.  Many  of  the  products  of  our  think- 
ing, generalizations  of  intelligence  or  con- 
structions of  the  imagination  as  they  may 
be  called,  do  acquire  the  standing  of  ob- 
jective fact  in  just  this  way:  they  agree 
with,  and  correlate,  a  number  of  different 
instances;  they  harmonize  many  discrepant 
and  conflicting  facts;  they  unify  and  re- 
duce to  system  a  mass  of  unrelated  and 
hence  bewildering  data.     This  is  what  oc- 


28  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

curs  in  the  every-day  life  of  all  of  us. 
Suppose  that  I  enter  my  classroom  one 
morning  and  instead  of  the  order,  neatness, 
and  warmth  which  I  expected  to  find,  am 
disconcerted  to  feel  a  rushing  draft  of  cold 
air,  to  see  a  jagged  hole  in  an  upper  win- 
dow-pane, and  to  observe  muddy  foot- 
prints on  the  floor.  For  the  moment,  I 
stand  perplexed,  trying  to  imagine  some 
explanation.  Then  I  remember  that  I 
saw  some  boys  engaged  in  a  ball  game 
just  outside  the  window  on  the  previous 
afternoon,  and  wonder  if  their  ball  did  the 
damage.  I  notice  that  the  window  broken 
is  on  the  side  of  the  room  toward  their 
playground,  that  the  hole  in  the  glass  is 
about  the  size  a  ball  would  make,  and  that 
the  mud  or  dust  upon  the  floor  is  such  as 
they  would  leave  if  they  had  entered  and 
searched  the  room  for  their  ball.  I  there- 
upon accept  my  hypothesis  as  true  in 
fact,  and  do  so  because  it  agrees  with  and 
correlates  all  the  data  present  to  my  senses. 
When    I    adopt    such    an    hypothesis   as 


INTRODUCTION  29 

truth,  moreover,  it  does  not  remain  some- 
thing distinct  from  and  added  to  the 
empirical  facts;  it  merges  with  and  be- 
comes part  of  these  facts.  The  broken 
window  now  becomes  the  window  broken 
by  the  ball,  and  the  muddy  footmarks 
the  footmarks  of  the  boys.  Thus  do 
fact  and  theory  merge  in  the  constitution 
of  our  real  world.  In  exactly  the  same 
way  are  many  scientiiBc  postulates  verified: 
they  are  accepted  as  true  because,  better 
than  any  other  beliefs,  they  agree  with 
the  many  variant  and  apparently  conflict- 
ing facts  in  a  certain  field,  and  reduce 
them  to  order  and  system.  On  this  ground 
the  theory  of  evolution  has  been  accepted 
by  scientists:  it  was  Darwin's  achievement 
to  have  assembled  the  facts  and  then  to 
have  shown  that  the  evolutionary  hypoth- 
esis was  the  only  generalization  sufficiently 
comprehensive  to  correlate  them  all. 

Kant  then  discovered  one  of  the  ways 
in  which  our  intellectual  constructions  are 
verified  and  given  standing  as  facts.     But 


30  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

this  was,  after  all,  but  one  method  of  veri- 
fication and  hence  furnished  only  a  partial 
solution  of  the  problem.  And  when  a 
partial  truth  is  taken  for  the  whole,  in 
any  field,  the  outcome  is  bound  to  be 
serious  error.  This  is  what  occurred  in 
the  development  of  Kant's  philosophy, 
and  particularly  in  the  thought  of  his 
immediate  successors  of  the  German  ideal- 
istic school.  Kant  made  it  plain  that  the 
laws  of  natural  science  are  hypotheses 
which  owe  their  objective  reality  to  the 
work  they  do — ^but  this  work,  as  he  thought, 
was  wholly  intellectual,  the  organization 
of  the  data  of  experience  into  an  ideal, 
a  conceptual,  system.  Now  his  followers 
Fichte,  Schelling,  and  particularly  Hegel, 
went  on,  as  they  believed,  to  develop  the 
logical  implications  of  his  standpoint.  Since 
the  work  of  thought  is  thus  to  organize 
the  data  of  experience,  the  ultimate  aim 
of  all  thinking,  or  Truth,  is  necessarily  a 
completed  intellectual  system,  a  system  of 
ideas  which  shall  comprehend  and  make 


INTRODUCTION  31 

place  for  every  detail  of  experience.  Since, 
furthermore,  our  thought  gains  objectivity- 
according  as  it  furthers  the  organization 
of  conscious  experience,  it  follows,  so  these 
thinkers  maintained,  that  a  completed  in- 
tellectual synthesis,  such  as  we  understand 
Truth  to  be,  is  also  identical  with  the 
fullest,  the  most  complete  Reality.  Now, 
it  is  obvious  that  such  an  ideal  unity  has 
been  achieved  in  no  human  experience, 
and  if  we  believe,  as  the  successors  of 
Kant  did  believe,  that  the  existence  of 
such  a  completely  organized  experience  is 
implied  in  the  efforts  of  our  intelligence  to 
organize  the  data  of  our  experience,  we 
must  suppose  that  it  takes  the  form  of 
a  superhuman  experience,  an  Absolute 
Thought,  in  which  all  the  details  of  our 
conscious  lives,  fragmentary  and  conflict- 
ing as  they  appear  to  be,  are  comprehended 
and  reconciled.  And,  as  by  the  exercise 
of  our  thought  we  continue  to  unify  and 
systematize  the  details  of  our  limited  ex- 
perience, in  an  increasing  degree  we  partic- 


32          FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

ipate  in  the  Absolute  Experience  and  share 
its  perfect  reahty. 

In  this  way  Kant's  theory  of  knowl- 
edge was  transformed  into  an  intellec- 
tualistic  philosophy.  For  it  is  plainly  a 
consequence  of  this  reasoning  that  man  as 
a  finite  being  attains  fuller  reahty  not  by 
endeavor  of  action  to  transform  the  ac- 
tual conditions  of  his  existence,  but  by 
eflFort  of  thought  to  see  things  as  they  are, 
all  comprehended  and  reconciled  within 
the  one  absolute  system.  This  position, 
once  taken,  has  further  consequences  re- 
pugnant to  our  moral  consciousness — con- 
sequences which  led  finally  to  the  rejection 
of  absolute  idealism  and,  unfortunately, 
to  the  partial  discrediting  of  the  Kantian 
principles  underlying  it.  If  reality  attaches 
only  to  that  which  is  embraced  within 
the  unity  of  the  Absolute  Experience, 
what  becomes  of  the  inconsistencies,  the 
discordant  and  conflicting  features  of  our 
human  experiences^  They  must  be  re- 
garded as  apparent,  not  real,  as  illusions 


INTRODUCTION  33 

due  to  our  imperfect  understanding,  cer- 
tain to  disappear  when  we  attain  the 
larger  vision.  The  difficulties  in  such  a  view 
come  home  to  us  with  special  force  in  two 
vitally  important  connections.  In  the  first 
place,  the  independence  and  initiative  of 
individual  human  wills  seem  to  violate 
that  perfected  unity  of  the  absolute  thought 
and  to  produce  persistent  opposition  and 
open  conflict  in  the  world  of  real  fact. 
Secondly,  evil  seems  to  be  rooted  in  a 
radical  maladjustment  in  the  nature  of 
things.  Now,  the  absolute  idealist,  if  true 
to  his  principle,  is  bound  to  regard  both 
human  freedom  and  the  different  forms  of 
evil  as  illusory  and  unreal:  in  so  far  as 
the  human  individual  attains  reahty,  he 
is  merged  in  the  Absolute  Experience,  and 
to  such  a  one,  who  sees  things  as  they  are, 
all  that  appears  to  be  evil  proves  to  be  a 
means  to  a  larger  good.  Such  a  view  dis- 
courages effort  and  belittles  moral  struggle; 
it  is  repugnant  to  the  conscience  of  the 
modern  world. 


34  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

Thus  a  check  was  given  to  the  growth 
of  a  new  humanism  existing  in  germ  in 
the  philosophy  of  Immanuel  Kant,  a  hu- 
manism which  sees  the  laws  of  natural 
science  in  their  true  character  as  working 
hypotheses,  as  plans  for  human  action  ac- 
cepted on  faith  and  tested  by  the  help 
they  give  man  in  enlarging  the  sphere  of 
his  conscious  control.  Kant  himself  as- 
sisted in  concealing  these  humanistic  im- 
pHcations  of  his  thought  when  he  made 
the  test  of  these  working  principles  exclu- 
sively intellectual.  This  led  his  successors 
finally  to  conceive  of  them  as  principles 
resident  in  the  world  for  thought  to  dis- 
cover rather  than  as  tools  or  instruments 
employed  by  man's  will  in  its  effort  to 
control  and  transform  the  world,  tested 
by  the  aid  they  supply  in  this  undertaking, 
and  replaced  by  other  principles  when 
these  prove  more  efficient.  To  conceive 
of  the  laws  of  nature  as  uniformities  of 
relation  required  to  maintain  the  coher- 
ence   and    completeness    of    the    Absolute 


INTRODUCTION  35 

Thought  IS  to  substitute  for  a  physical, 
a  logical,  determinism,  just  as  fatal  to 
man's  freedom  and  opportunity  for  per- 
sonal development  as  the  most  thorough- 
going materialism. 

Further  knowledge,  both  of  the  inter- 
dependence of  thought  and  action  and  of 
scientific  methods  of  verification,  was  re- 
quired before  the  momentous  consequences 
of  Kant's  Copernican  change  of  position 
in  philosophy  could  be  rightly  understood 
and  appreciated.  Nearly  a  century  elapsed 
before  this  knowledge  had  been  gained, 
and  it  remained  for  an  American  school 
of  philosophy  to  prove  conclusively  that 
all  belief,  in  science  as  well  as  in  religion, 
depended  upon  practice  for  its  verification. 
The  genius  of  WiUiam  James,  co-operating 
with  the  incisive  thought  of  John  Dewey, 
developed  a  doctrine  well  known  as  Prag- 
matism, which  is  destined  to  stand  as  a 
permanent  contribution  to  the  solution  of 
philosophic  problems.  Two  facts  deeply 
impressed  the  minds  of  these  original  prag- 


36  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

matists  and  suggested  their  famous  doc- 
trine: the  discovery  by  genetic  psychology 
that  in  organic  evolution  intelligence  has 
been  developed  as  an  aid  to  action,  a  means 
of  adjustment,  and  the  general  recognition 
by  working  scientists  that  their  so-called 
laws  are  not  transcriptions  of  reality  but 
man-made  instruments  whose  use  is  to 
correlate  old  facts  and  lead  to  new  ones. 
These  and  other  facts  seemed  to  the  found- 
ers of  pragmatism  to  justify  the  general 
conclusion  that  the  test  of  truth  is  always 
success  in  practice,  that  those  ideas  are 
true  which,  when  acted  upon,  lead  us  to 
the  results  we  expect  and  desire.  Other 
verification  than  this,  they  maintained, 
there  is  none:  there  is  no  significant  dif- 
ference for  thought  which  does  not  make 
a  difference  in  action.  A  practical  dif- 
ficulty, a  situation  to  which  no  habitual 
response  is  adequate,  furnishes  the  oc- 
casion for  thought;  the  solution  of  this 
difficulty  constitutes  its  validation.  For 
this  doctrine  that  all  thought  takes  the 


INTRODUCTION  87 

form  of  belief,  which  looks  forward  to  the 
results  of  action  to  be  verified,  the  prag- 
matists  found  ample  confirmation  in  all 
the  leading  departments  of  human  ex- 
perience: in  the  ordinary  conduct  of  daily 
life,  in  religious  faith,  in  scientific  pro- 
cedure. The  truth  of  my  belief  that  this 
road  leads  to  the  lake  is  ascertained  by 
walking  down  it  and  observing  where  it 
comes  out.  The  truth  of  my  belief  that 
this  fabric  is  fast  color  is  found  out  when, 
on  wearing  it,  I  expose  it  to  the  sun  and 
rain.  In  religion,  whose  hypotheses  are  not 
subject  to  the  usual  tests  of  experience, 
beliefs  are  tested  by  their  effects  (primarily 
emotional)  upon  the  mind  of  the  believer: 
do  they  give  him  the  hope  and  courage  to 
struggle  on  in  pursuit  of  his  ideals,  or  the 
resignation  and  fortitude  required  to  en- 
able him  to  endure  his  trials  and  disap- 
pointments? By  their  "fruits,"  not  by 
their  "roots"  we  should  know  them,  said 
James  of  religious  beliefs.  In  science  the 
true  theory  is  the  theory  which  enables 


38         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

the  investigator  to  predict  what  will  happen 
when,  under  laboratory  conditions,  natural 
processes  are  allowed  to  take  their  course. 
The  belief  that  water  is  composed  of  two 
parts  hydrogen  and  one  part  oxygen  is 
verified  when  in  the  chemical  laboratory 
a  combination  of  these  elements  in  this 
proportion  is  observed  to  result  in  the 
familiar  substance. 

The  doctrine  of  pragmatism  made  an 
instant  appeal  to  popular  intelligence — in 
particular  to  minds  which  were  seeking  a 
new  basis  for  religious  faith  in  the  world 
of  modern  science.  The  popular  vogue 
of  pragmatism  was  largely  due  to  the  sim- 
plicity, the  clearness,  and  the  practicality 
of  its  cardinal  principle,  presenting  such  a 
striking  contrast  to  the  labored  argument 
and  technical  subtlety  of  traditional  meta- 
physics. But,  as  the  case  is  bound  to  be 
with  apparently  simple,  sun-clear,  and  open- 
air  philosophies,  when  pragmatism  was 
interpreted,  amended,  and  elaborated  to 
meet  a  flood  of  hostile  criticism  it  became 


INTRODUCTION  3d 

as  complicated  and  abstruse  as  any  highly 
wrought  product  of  the  philosopher's  study. 
Two  of  the  criticisms  directed  against  the 
pragmatist  doctrine  have  especial  interest 
for  us:  one  concerns  the  fields  in  which 
ideas  "work";  the  other  has  to  do  with 
the  character  of  the  result  which  gives 
verification  to  our  ideas  when  they  are 
acted  upon.  With  reference  to  the  first 
point  critics  at  once  maintained,  and  the 
pragmatists  acknowledged  the  force  of  their 
argument,  that  ideas  work  intellectually 
as  well  as  in  the  field  of  action.  One  of 
the  leading  functions  of  ideas  is  to  correlate 
other  ideas;  beliefs  and  conceptions  are 
accepted  as  true  because  they  reduce  to 
order  and  system  many  previous  judg- 
ments which,  as  they  stand,  are  not  merely 
diflFerent  but  contradictory.  On  these 
grounds,  as  we  have  seen  in  reviewing 
Kant's  theory,  many  of  the  generalizations 
of  natural  science  are  adopted  as  true. 
In  its  original  statement,  indeed,  prag- 
matism tended  to  be  as  one-sided  in  its 


40  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

emphasis  upon  the  adjustment  of  acts  as 
the  Kantian  theory  was  in  its  preoccupa- 
tion with  intellectual  synthesis.  Upon 
the  second  point,  hostile  criticism  main- 
tained that  the  outcome  which  was  sup- 
posed by  pragmatism  to  establish  the 
truth  of  the  belief  which  guided  the  action 
could  not  be  the  pleasure  or  satisfaction 
of  the  individual  agent,  nor  even  his  ma- 
terial comfort  and  prosperity;  for  these 
results  are  frequently  obtained  by  in- 
dividuals who  are  acting  upon  beliefs  gen- 
erally admitted  to  be  false,  while  con- 
versely many  an  idea  which  the  experience 
of  humanity  proves  to  be  true  has  brought 
to  the  individual  who  acted  under  its 
guidance  only  disappointment  and  poverty 
and  misery.  Many  persons,  for  instance, 
have  achieved  material  prosperity,  have 
accumulated  fortunes,  by  acting  upon  the 
belief  that  every  man  has  his  price  and 
that  one  must  outwit  his  fellows  if  he  does 
not  wish  to  have  them  outwit  him — but 
such  results  do  not  prove  the  truth  of  the 


INTRODUCTION  41 

belief  in  question.  No,  the  true  idea  is 
the  idea  which  works  "in  the  long  run," 
and  when  we  take  the  long  run  into  con- 
sideration we  have  to  acknowledge  the 
underlying  identity  of  all  human  interests 
and  say  that  truth  belongs  to  those  be- 
liefs which,  when  taken  for  guides  of  ac- 
tion, contribute  to  the  ultimate  good  of 
humanity.  This  pragmatists  have  been 
loath  to  admit,  but  it  is  impossible  to 
see  how,  if  they  do  not,  their  theory  of 
knowledge  escapes  individualism  and  sub- 
jectivism. Unless  amended  in  some  such 
way,  it  is  little  better  than  the  teachings 
of  the  ancient  Sophists;  it  makes  such  be- 
hefs  true  as  the  individual  finds  it  advan- 
tageous to  hold. 

It  is  evident,  therefore,  that  if  practical 
success  be  adopted  as  the  criterion  of 
truth,  practice  cannot  be  understood  as 
meaning  mere  outward  action,  the  ad- 
justment of  the  living  individual  to  his 
natural  environment.  It  must  be  inter- 
preted in  a  larger  sense  as  identical  with 


42          FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

all  voluntary  action,  all  purposive  activity. 
If  it  is  thus  understood  there  is  no  con- 
ceivable ground  for  excluding  the  fields 
of  thought  and  emotion  from  its  territory: 
surely  both  intellectual  and  aesthetic  ac- 
tivity may  be  purposive,  voluntary;  truth 
and  beauty  may  be  ends  sought  by  will, 
as  well  as  prosperity  and  efficiency.  It 
must  be  identified  with  the  satisfaction 
of  human  personahty  in  its  universal  as- 
pect. It  means  the  realization  of  the 
personal  capacities  of  every  human  in- 
dividual, means  the  fullest  personal  de- 
velopment of  humanity.  To  such  a  prag- 
matism as  this  the  ethical  idealist  should 
have  no  objection:  to  be  sure,  it  sub- 
ordinates truth  to  the  ultimate  moral 
purpose  of  the  world,  but  such  purpose 
the  idealist  takes  to  be  the  ground  of  all 
existence  whatsoever. 

This  new  humanism  which  modern  phi- 
losophy offers  us,  able  to  restore  our  con- 
fidence in  the  powers  of  personality  so 
badly  shaken  by  the  great  wave  of  nat- 


INTRODUCTION  43 

uralism  which  followed  the  extension  of 
the  scientific  world- view,  is  thus  a  synthesis 
of  critical  idealism  and  pragmatism.  It 
recognizes  toill  as  fundamental  to  human 
personality,  as  the  root  of  human  activity, 
the  source  of  human  progress.  Thought, 
then,  is  a  particular  expression,  a  special- 
ized function  of  will.  All  ideas  are  orig- 
inally programmes  of  action  which  look 
forward  to  conduct  for  fulfilment  and 
realization.  Hence  all  beliefs  are  orig- 
inally postulates,  and  faith  is  prior  to 
fact;  for  ideas  must  first  be  adopted  and 
acted  upon  before  they  can  be  estabUshed 
as  facts.  The  fields  of  conduct  in  which 
ideas  are  thus  tested  are  those  of  thought 
itself,  of  action,  and  of  feeling;  in  these 
three  departments  of  his  life,  intellectual, 
technical,  and  aesthetic,  man  is  pursuing 
his  personal  ideals  and,  through  the  out- 
come of  this  activity,  is  receiving  the 
judgment  of  reality  upon  his  beliefs.  The 
result  which  certifies  the  truth  of  a  belief 
is  the  same  in  these  three  fields  of  prac- 


44  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

tice — extension  of  the  sphere  of  man's 
conscious  control,  enlargement  of  the  con- 
tent of  his  personal  life. 

Such  is  the  view  which  underlies  the  in- 
terpretation of  human  progress  to  be  given 
in  these  lectures.  The  types  of  belief,  or 
forms  of  faith,  both  scientific  and  relig- 
ious, which  characterize  each  of  the  main 
stages  in  man's  social  evolution  will  be 
considered  in  their  relations  of  dependence 
and  development.  Thus  we  shall  permit 
the  course  of  progress  itself  to  speak  con- 
cerning the  validity  of  the  great  determin- 
ing beliefs  of  human  history.  But  before 
beginning  this  survey,  we  must  pause  for 
a  brief  consideration  of  the  nature  and 
workings  of  the  human  will,  the  source 
of  man's  personal  power,  and  of  his  social 
progress. 


CHAPTER  I 

THE  WILL  AS  THE  TRUE  SOURCE  OF 
HUMAN  PROGRESS 

Will  is  an  activity  which,  Hke  Hfe  itself, 
IS  so  pervasive,  so  many-sided,  so  incalcu- 
lable, as  to  resist  definition,  since  to  define 
we  must  make  distinctions  and  set  limits. 
In  attempts  to  characterize  will,  one  is 
most  likely  to  err  through  emphasizing 
one  of  its  two  leading  aspects  at  the  ex- 
pense of  the  other.  Some  investigators 
concern  themselves  altogether  with  the 
influence  of  will  upon  outward  action; 
they  conceive  it  as  a  control  or  co-ordina- 
tion of  bodily  movement.  This  concep- 
tion of  volition  primarily  in  terms  of 
organic  behavior  suggests  an  explanation 
of  voluntary  action  in  terms  of  mechanical 
causation,  and  leads  to  a  neglect  of  that 

45 


46  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

other  most  notable  and  distinctive  feature 
of  volition,  the  ability  to  choose  between 
ends  and  to  originate  courses  of  activity. 
Absorption  in  this  second,  the  "spiritual" 
side  of  voluntary  activity  leads,  on  its 
part,  to  a  conception  of  the  will  equally 
abstract.  Impressed  by  the  fact  that  will 
is  free  from  the  shackles  of  natural  causa- 
tion, that  its  activities  are  in  some  sense 
self-caused,  moralists  have  often  been  led 
to  an  empty  and  negative  conception  of 
will,  as  essentially  characterized  by  its 
lack  of  any  determination  whatsoever. 

If  we  would  understand  the  character 
of  will  as  an  actually  existing  power  of 
human  nature,  we  must  for  the  moment 
turn  away  both  from  the  principles  of 
biology  and  the  metaphysics  of  freedom, 
and  look  directly  at  it  as  it  operates  in  the 
conduct  of  man,  both  in  the  evolution  of 
human  society  and  in  our  own  choices 
and  pursuits.  This  we  shall,  of  course, 
be  doing  when  we  review  the  principal 
stages  in   man's   social   development,   but 


THE  WILL  47 

a  preliminary  statement  will  be  useful  in 
clearing  the  ground  for  this  survey.  When 
we  thus  look  directly  at  the  workings  of 
will  in  our  experience  we  find  it  acting  in 
two  capacities.  We  find,  first,  that  it  is  a 
factor  in  the  physical  world  of  bodies  and 
of  motion,  that  it  directs  the  movements 
of  the  physical  organism  which  it  inhabits, 
and  in  consequence  determines  the  move- 
ments of  other  bodies  both  living  and 
non-living.  Through  the  instrumentality 
of  his  physical  organism,  man  combines 
the  materials  and  harnesses  the  forces  of 
nature:  thus  he  builds  habitations  and 
conveyances,  fashions  tools  and  weapons, 
constructs  machines;  he  also  assembles 
other  human  individuals  for  purposes  of 
intercourse,  industry,  war,  and  govern- 
ment. But  all  these  actions  he  performs 
as  a  means  to  the  attainment  of  ends, 
that  is,  personal  satisfactions.  Thus  we 
find  will  acting  in  a  second  capacity  quite 
different  from  the  first:  that  of  choosing 
between    different    objects    in    accordance 


48          FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

with  their  value  as  ends.  Now,  these  ob- 
jects which  are  chosen  as  sources  of  per- 
sonal satisfaction  diflfer  in  many  ways,  no- 
tably in  their  degree  of  comprehensiveness. 
Some  are  specific  and  temporary,  such 
as  an  article  of  food  desired  at  any  partic- 
ular moment;  others  are  more  general  and 
lasting,  such  as  wealth  or  family  prestige; 
others  are  still  more  inclusive,  such  as 
national  welfare  or  the  knowledge  of  truth. 
But  whenever  will  is  exercised  continuously 
and  is  thus  given  opportunity  for  self- 
expression,  we  find  it  selecting  and  seeking 
the  most  comprehensive  ends,  those  ends 
which  include  the  largest  number  of  par- 
ticular satisfactions  and  promise  to  pro- 
duce the  fullest  and  richest  personal  life. 
Thus,  will,  viewed  in  the  light  of  human 
history  and  experience,  appears  as  a  power 
constantly  striving  so  to  control  the  forces 
of  nature  and  to  adjust  the  tendencies  of 
social  life  as  to  bring  about  the  most  com- 
prehensive satisfaction  of  human  personal- 
ity. 


THE  WILL  49 

When  we  consider  the  abilities  which 
are  prerequisite  to  the  operation  of  will, 
a  voluntary  action  seems  a  notable  achieve- 
ment. So,  in  fact,  it  is;  among  living 
creatures  only  man  is,  as  far  as  we  know, 
capable  of  volition.  Yet  any  child  of  three 
or  four  years,  of  suflScient  mental  develop- 
ment to  have  a  desire  and  to  seek  its  ful- 
filment, possesses  this  power.  Indeed,  a 
simple  act  of  volition,  such  as  any  child  is 
capable  of,  may  illustrate  in  an  effective 
way  the  different  factors  which  co-operate 
in  all  voluntary  activity. 

Suppose  that  a  child  of  four,  tired  of 
play  outdoors,  comes  into  the  house.  The 
room  which  he  enters  contains  familiar 
toys  which  excite  the  play  impulse  in  him, 
and  packages  as  yet  unopened  which 
awaken  his  instinctive  curiosity.  This 
pressure  of  instinct  and  impulse  he  is 
able  to  resist,  however,  because  a  definite 
desire  has  seized  him.  In  obedience  to 
this  desire  he,  disregarding  everything  else, 
walks    straight    across    the    room    to    his 


50         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

mother's  side  and  asks  her  to  tell  him  a 
story,  a  new  story  with  soldiers  in  it  (for 
he  has  just  seen  soldiers  passing).  When 
she  demurs  he  continues  to  urge;  finally, 
he  gains  her  consent  and  sits  down  satis- 
fied by  the  prospect  of  the  coming  tale. 

In  such  a  case  of  action  from  desire  we 
have  a  simple  instance  of  that  voluntary 
activity  which  is  the  root  and  source  of 
all  personal  life.  For  the  child  who  thus 
acts  from  conscious  desire  refuses  longer 
to  permit  nature,  in  the  form  of  inborn 
instinct  and  involuntary  impulse,  to  act 
through  him;  he  asserts  his  right  as  a  free 
being  to  determine  his  own  action  as  his 
intelligence  approves.  Now,  even  in  our 
example,  which  illustrates  will  at  the  earliest 
stage  of  its  development  and  consequently 
in  its  simplest  form,  we  can  distinguish 
in  the  operation  of  willing  or  volition 
three  factors. 

The  first  of  these  is  thought  and  imagina' 
tion.  The  boy  imagines  his  mother  telUng 
hini  a  story,  and  this,  his  idea  of  something 


THE  WILL  51 

which  does  not  yet  exist,  sets  itself  in 
sharp  contrast  to  objects  actually  present 
to  his  senses,  such  as  toys  or  books.  Un- 
less the  human  individual  is  able  to  con- 
ceive or  imagine  objects  not  yet  existent, 
he  will  be  unable  through  his  own  initiative 
to  realize  such  objects.  The  idea  itself, 
the  imagined  story-telling,  that  is,  is  the 
outcome  of  previous  experience,  of  mem- 
ories of  stories  asked  for,  told,  and  enjoyed. 
But  in  thought  past  experience  is  not 
merely  revived  and  opposed  to  present 
fact;  it  is  taken  to  pieces,  altered,  re- 
combined.  Thus,  the  story  asked  for 
need  not  be  identical  with  the  one  last 
told,  but  may  be  a  new  one  whose  sub- 
ject had  been  suggested  by  that  day's 
play.  Thought,  reinterpreting  rather  than 
reproducing  past  experience,  gives  expres- 
sion to  the  unitary  self  or  personality 
which  is  developing  throughout  the  course 
of  such  experience. 

The  second  factor  is  feeling.     Because 
he  has  enjoyed  the  stories  told  him  in  the 


52  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

past  the  child  finds  the  idea  of  Hstening 
to  a  story  very  pleasant.  But  while  the 
story  told  him  remains  merely  an  idea,  it 
conflicts  with  the  actual  facts.  This  con- 
flict between  what  is  wished  for  and  what 
actually  exists  produces  strain  and  tension 
in  the  child's  consciousness,  which  is  felt 
as  painful.  When  he  wins  the  desired  con- 
sent, however,  and  the  story  begins,  he 
feels  pleasure  in  ''getting  his  wish,"  thus 
removing  from  his  mind  the  conflict  be- 
tween idea  and  actual  fact.  Feeling  re- 
flects the  effect  upon  the  self  of  seeking 
and  attaining  new  objects. 

Action  is  the  third  factor.  Moved  by 
the  idea  of  the  story  which  he  desires  but 
does  not  hear,  the  child  takes  steps  which, 
he  believes,  will  bring  the  longed-for  result. 
He  intercedes  with  his  mother  in  the 
manner  which  promises  to  be  most  effec- 
tive, meeting  objections  with  the  best  re- 
plies he  can  devise,  until  at  last  the  result 
is  gained.  In  action,  the  individual  grap- 
ples   with    the    actual    situation,    and    so 


THE  WILL  53 

transforms  it  as  to  provide  for  the  realiza- 
tion of  his  idea. 

But  while  thought,  feeling,  and  action 
are  all  essential  to  the  operation  of  voli- 
tion, in  none  of  them  do  we  find  its  essen- 
tial quality  revealed.  No  one  of  them 
may  be  said  to  determine  the  will;  for, 
in  the  first  place,  volition  is  more  than 
the  execution  of  a  programme  thought 
out  beforehand  in  every  detail.  It  is 
impossible  through  thought  to  foresee  the 
actual  course  of  events  at  every  point. 
No  amount  of  thinking — even  if  he  pos- 
sessed all  the  wisdom  of  his  elders — would 
assure  the  boy  of  our  illustration  of  his 
mother's  consent,  or  anticipate  her  every 
objection.  Then,  secondly,  volition  is  more 
than  the  resultant  of  feelings  produced  by 
past  experience .  and  influencing  present 
conduct,  for  the  pleasures  of  the  past 
have  all  of  them  arisen  from  special  situa- 
tions, and  the  past  guarantees  their  repeti- 
tion only  when  the  situation  itself  is  re- 
produced.   But  our  wills  are  always  facing 


54         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

new  situations  whose  pleasure-giving  pos- 
sibilities are  uncertain.  If  it  is  not  a  new 
story  that  the  child  wishes  for,  it  is  an  old 
story  on  a  new  occasion  and  the  enjoy- 
ment it  will  furnish  can  only  be  ascer- 
tained by  trying  it.  Finally,  volition  is 
more  than  the  outcome  of  action.  To 
attain  such  result  as  the  circumstances 
permit,  in  the  most  skilful  manner  pos- 
sible, is  not  to  exercise  volition.  A  result 
must  be  gained  in  order  to  satisfy  the  will, 
surely — ^but  it  must  be  such  a  result  as 
appeals  to  the  doer  because  of  his  own 
personal  experience  and,  for  this  reason, 
such  a  result  as  satisfies  himself.  To  be 
able  to  persuade  his  mother  to  tell  the 
story  will  not  satisfy  the  will  of  the  boy 
unless,  because  of  his  own  experience,  he 
has  come  to  enjoy  story-telling. 

The  true  nature  of  will  is  revealed  only 
when  we  understand  it  as  embracing 
thought,  feeling,  and  action  equally,  not 
merely  assembled  as  parts,  but  merged  by 
their  co-operation  into  a  vital  unity.     We 


THE  WILL  55 

discover  the  essential  quality  of  volition 
when  we  think  of  it  as  an  activity  which 
is  ever  striving,  through  a  variety  of  chosen 
objects,  toward  a  general  end  or  result, 
and  this  result  is  self-expansion,  the  ex- 
pansion of  the  boundaries  of  conscious 
Kfe  until  it  shall  include  and  assimilate 
everything  that  is  real.  Will  is,  therefore, 
the  cause  of  all  our  human  development, 
being  both  the  demand  which  we  as  in- 
telUgent  persons  make  for  more  life  and 
a  larger  world  and  also  the  power  to  at- 
tain such  life  and  to  realize  such  a  world. 
Subjectively,  it  manifests  itself  as  the 
capacity  for  faith,  belief  in  the  ability  of 
conscious  personality  ultimately  to  master 
and  absorb  all  that  exists,  and  thus  gain 
for  itself  permanence  and  reality.  Such 
faith  does  not  contradict  reason  or  dis- 
regard fact;  it  is  based  upon  reason  and 
utiUzes  such  facts  as  a  rational  interpre- 
tation of  past  experience  furnishes.  But 
it  refuses  to  be  limited  by  past  experience; 
it   proposes    to    discover   new   facts    that 


56         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

shall  enlarge  the  scope  and  enrich  the 
content  of  personal  life.  Objectively,  it 
appears  as  the  ability  to  venture,  the  will- 
ingness to  abandon  objects  already  at- 
tained and  proved  satisfactory  for  the 
sake  of  other  objects  as  yet  unattained 
and  uncertain,  which  promise  larger  pos- 
sibilities of  satisfaction.  This  venturing 
is  not  the  foolhardiness  which  contemp- 
tuously flings  aside  hard-won  and  certain 
goods  in  the  pursuit  of  objects  whose 
promises  are  alluring  but  deceptive;  it  is 
rather  that  true  courage  which  dares  to 
jeopardize  the  limited  although  secure  satis- 
faction of  the  present  in  a  deliberate  and 
strenuous  attempt  to  attain  new  objects 
which,  in  the  larger  life  they  involve,  make 
permanent  place  for,  and  impart  new  signif- 
icance to,  the  satisfactions  at  the  time  sur- 
rendered. Even  in  our  trivial  instance  we 
find  the  essential  character  of  vohtion  il- 
lustrated. The  child  resists  the  appeal 
of  surrounding  objects  to  his  senses  and 
asks   for  a  story  because  his  germinating 


THE  WILL  57 

personality  demands  expansion  in  an  ob- 
ject which  shall  express  himself.  He  shows 
faith,  for  he  believes  in  what  no  wisdom, 
human  or  divine,  could  predict  for  a  cer- 
tainty— that  his  mother  can  be  persuaded 
to  tell  the  story.  He  is  able  to  venture, 
for  he  gives  up  the  assured  pleasure  which 
his  toys  would  furnish  in  order  to  seek  an 
object  which,  although  it  contained  larger 
possibilities  of  self-satisfaction,  was  at  the 
time  remote  and  uncertain. 

It  is  this  activity  of  volition,  maintain- 
ing faith  in  the  power  and  permanence  of 
personality,  and  daring  to  venture  for  the 
sake  of  a  fuller  life  and  a  larger  world, 
which  is  the  true  cause  of  all  man's  prog- 
ress. In  the  pages  which  follow  we  shall 
see  it  determining  the  successive  stages 
of  human  development. 

"We  cannot  kindle  when  we  will 
The  fire  which  in  the  heart  resides; 
The  spirit  bloweth  and  is  still, 
In  mystery  our  soul  abides. 

But  tasks  in  hours  of  insight  will'd 
Can  be  through  hours  of  gloom  fulfilled. 


58         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

"With  aching  hands  and  bleeding  feet 
We  dig  and  heap,  lay  stone  on  stone; 
We  bear  the  burden  and  the  heat 
Of  the  long  day,  and  wish  'twere  done. 
Not  till  the  hours  of  light  return. 
All  we  have  built  do  we  discern." 

(^Arnold:    *' Morality,") 


CHAPTER  II 
THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE 

The  simplest  and  lowest  type  of  human 
life  is  that  absorbed  in  the  gratification  of 
momentary  desire.  At  the  dawn  of  its 
development  man's  will  finds  expression 
in  the  pursuit  of  objects  which  attract 
it  by  the  pleasure  they  promise  at  the 
very  moment.  This  type  of  life,  given 
over  to  the  pursuit  of  present  pleasure, 
may  therefore  be  taken  as  the  initial  step 
in  human  progress. 

In  thus  distinguishing  a  kind  of  human 
life  entirely  given  to  the  gratification 
of  present  desire,  we  are  by  no  means 
asserting  that  men  or  groups  of  men  have 
ever  lived  so  preoccupied  with  present 
pleasure  as  never  in  the  whole  course 
of  their  existence  to  have  had  a  single 
thought  for  the  future  or  its  hazards. 
This  may  well  be  doubted,  for  the  instinct 

59 


60  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

of  self-preservation  would  prompt  men  to 
seek  escape  from  future  pain  as  soon  as 
the  first  ray  of  self-conscious  intelligence 
had  appeared.  But  it  is  also  true  that 
races  or  tribes  of  men  do  exist  and  have 
existed  whose  life  is,  in  the  main,  a  pursuit 
of  the  objects  of  momentary  desire.  With 
the  advance  of  civilization  such  groups 
become  rarer;  their  life  is  of  necessity 
savage  and  nomadic,  and  possible  only 
.under  exceptionally  favorable  conditions. 
These  conditions  are  actually  realized  in 
some  equatorial  regions  and  tropical  isles 
where  neither  clothing  nor  shelter  is  re- 
quired for  the  preservation  of  existence, 
and  abundance  of  food  is  ready  at  hand. 
So  situated,  men  can  live  and  do  live 
without  serious  thought  for  the  morrow, 
absorbed  in  the  enjoyment  now  of  food, 
now  of  play,  now  of  rest,  now  of  com- 
panionship, combat,  and  sexual  or  parental 
love.  Then,  among  more  civilized  peoples 
are  individuals  whose  lives  rarely  rise 
above  this  first  low  plane  of  attainment — 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  61 

only  here  the  social  environment  does  not 
usually  permit  the  uninterrupted  indul- 
gence of  present  desire,  even  if  it  were 
otherwise  possible.  We  all  know  of  in- 
dividuals whose  momentary  desires  are  so 
strong  and  whose  power  of  realizing  future 
consequences  is  so  weak  that  they  are 
unable  for  long  to  keep  out  of  the  clutches 
of  the  law.  Still  further,  even  among  the 
most  civilized  of  men,  persons  whose  lives 
are  for  the  most  part  thoroughly  regulated 
have  periods  of  moral  relaxation  in  which 
they  seem  incapable  of  doing  more  than 
following  momentary  impulse:  we  all  de- 
mand, as  William  James  puts  it,  our 
"moral  holidays."  This  type  of  life,  de- 
voted to  the  quest  of  present  pleasure, 
constitutes  the  beginning  of  man's  de- 
velopment away  from  the  animal  with  its 
blind  instincts  and  dumb  stirrings;  it  is 
in  truth  the  primitive  human  life. 

Man's  first  movements  in  pursuit  of  ob- 
jects are  not  the  result  of  his  conscious 


62  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

choice;  in  truth,  they  do  not  come  from 
his  will  at  all.  These  movements  have 
their  source  in  the  mechanism  of  the  hu- 
man body.  Man  is  born  with  certain 
paths  of  connection  already  established  in 
his  nervous  system.  These  established 
nervous  connections  cause  him  to  react 
with  definite  sequences  of  movement  when 
his  sense-organs  are  stimulated  in  certain 
ways.  They  are  called  instincts,  and  it  is 
instinct  which  leads  the  human  individual 
first  to  eat,  to  sleep,  to  play,  to  talk,  to 
imitate,  to  resent.  Instinct  operates  me- 
chanically, as  a  bell  rings  when  the  button 
is  pressed.  Sometimes  it  is  an  article  of 
food  which,  when  visible,  presses  the  button; 
the  ringing  which  follows  takes  the  form 
of  movements  to  grasp,  to  bite,  to  swallow. 
Sometimes  it  is  the  sound  of  an  approach- 
ing enemy  which  presses  the  button;  then 
the  ringing  of  the  bell  consists  in  the  move- 
ments of  limbs  requisite  to  speedy  flight. 
Or  it  may  be  that  by  the  look  or  voice  of 
another  human  being  the  button  is  pressed; 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  63 

then  the  movements  of  play  or  of  combat 
or  of  imitation  constitute  the  response. 
But  although  instinctive  movements  have 
no  conscious  motives,  they  are  accompanied 
by  consciousness:  the  individual  who  re- 
acts feels  the  exertion  of  moving  to  secure 
the  object,  and  the  pleasure  of  possessing 
it.  Such  experiences  of  movement  and 
resulting  pleasure  associate  themselves  in 
memory  with  the  sensations  that  orig- 
inally came  from  the  object  and  stimulated 
the  movement.  The  result  of  the  associa- 
tion is  an  idea  of  the  object  as  an  end  of 
action,  that  is,  a  source  of  satisfaction. 
Thus  in  the  early  stage  of  his  mental  de- 
velopment man  comes  to  have  ideas  of 
different  classes  of  objects  that  appeal 
to  his  various  instincts.  The  world  into 
which  human  intelligence  awakens  con- 
tains, therefore,  many  kinds  of  objects 
that  are  interesting,  that  possess  value 
because  they  promise  enjoyment  when 
attained.  These  attractive  objects  fall 
into  two  large  groups.     There  are  inan- 


64  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

imate  objects,  such  as  food  and  drink  and 
coverings,  which  appeal  to  the  instincts  of 
food  and  shelter  and  curiosity.  Besides 
these  are  living  beings  which  arouse  such 
instincts  as  those  of  sex,  of  companion- 
ship, of  play,  and  of  combat. 

Here,  then,  we  find  the  true  beginnings 
of  the  life  of  voluntary  achievement.  Upon 
these  objects  of  natural  instinct,  become 
ends  of  conscious  desire,  the  human  will 
is  directed:  in  pursuing  and  appropriat- 
ing them  volition  achieves  the  first  step 
in  self-expansion. 

Man's  power  of  will  is  originally  mani- 
fested, then,  in  seeking  the  object  which  he 
at  the  moment  desires  to  obtain — the  fruit 
on  the  neighboring  tree,  the  companion- 
ship of  a  fellow,  the  refreshing  coolness  of 
a  plunge  in  the  stream,  the  smile  or  caress 
of  a  maiden,  the  view  from  the  distant 
hilltop.  Looked  back  upon  from  the  van- 
tage-point of  later  development,  such  in- 
dulgence of  momentary  desire  seems  sim- 
ple and  easy  enough:  the  only  effort  which 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  65 

civilized  man  exerts  in  connection  with 
momentary  desire  is  that  required  to  re- 
sist its  inherent  impulsion  and  to  restrain 
it  in  the  interest  of  future  well-being. 
From  this  superior  standpoint  it  may 
seem  absurd  to  regard  the  gratification 
of  passing  desire  as  an  achievement  of 
spirit,  a  triumph  of  personality.  Why, 
it  may  be  asked,  is  faith  required  to  yield 
to  the  urgency  of  present  impulse,  where 
is  the  element  of  venture  in  seizing  and 
enjoying  what  one  happens  at  the  time  to 
want?  But  faith  and  venture  are  both  of 
them  present,  nevertheless;  desire  is  a 
genuine  expression  of  will  and  these  fea- 
tures are  inevitable  accompaniments  of 
volition.  Faith  is  present  because  the 
fulfilment  of  simple  desire  involves  belief 
in  the  reality  of  the  ideal.  The  object  of 
desire  does  not  exist  except  as  an  idea  in 
the  mind  of  the  actor,  yet  his  belief  in  the 
reality  of  his  idea  is  strong  enough  to 
cause  him  to  disregard  all  other  things 
actually  surrounding  him  and  to  expend 


66  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

effort  in  seeking  this  ideal  object.  Faith 
is  exercised  even  when  the  object  desired 
is  not  merely  imagined  (as  is  frequently 
the  case),  but  is  actually  present  to  the 
senses,  tempting  him  with  its  alluring 
qualities;  for  it  is  never  the  object  as 
present  to  the  senses  merely,  which  is 
desired  and  sought:  it  is  such  a  sense- 
object  conceived  as  an  end,  that  is,  thought 
of  as  affording  specific  satisfactions.  Thus, 
when  the  savage  desires  the  fruit  he  sees 
hanging  from  the  tree,  it  is  not  simply  the 
fruit  which  he  perceives  by  sense  of  sight 
that  he  desires,  but  the  fruit  which  he 
imagines  as  possessing  certain  pleasant 
qualities — that,  for  instance,  it  is  sweet  to 
the  taste,  cool  and  moistening  to  the 
throat,  appeasing  to  hunger,  etc.  To  seek 
an  object  of  desire  is  also  to  venture.  For 
the  outcome  of  the  simplest  activity  under- 
taken in  response  to  desire  is  in  some  de- 
gree uncertain.  The  object  may  fail  to 
possess  the  looked-for  qualities,  the  agent 
may  prove  incapable  of  enjoying  them  even 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  67 

if  they  are  there,  some  unexpected  event 
may  frustrate  his  endeavor.  In  such  case 
he  will  have  expended  effort  in  vain,  he  may 
have  missed  beneficial  influences  from  the 
objects  of  his  former  environment,  he  may 
have  incurred  exhausting  fatigue  or  met 
with  injurious  accident.  Thus  the  savage 
who  climbs  the  tree  after  the  desired  fruit 
may  find  it  sour  and  unpalatable,  or  its 
expected  sweetness  may  prove  unpleasant 
and  nauseating,  or  he  may  fail  in  his 
eflFort  to  climb  the  tree,  perhaps  falling 
and  incurring  injury.  In  such  cases  he 
certainly  will  have  expended  energy  fruit- 
lessly (no  light  matter  with  him,  it  may  be) , 
he  may  have  missed  the  refreshing  sleep 
which  the  quiet  and  the  shade  would  have 
brought  him  had  he  remained  lying  in  the 
grass  beneath,  and  it  is  possible  that  he 
might  be  crippled  by  a  fall. 

Now  it  is  just  this  faith,  whether  justi- 
fied or  not,  which  creates  for  man  his  first 
world.  For  in  the  operation  of  momentary 
desire  a  postulate  is  impHed.     This  post- 


68  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

ulate,  when  explicitly  stated,  is  that  partic- 
ular objects  exist  which,  when  attained,  will 
exhibit  certain  characteristic  qualities.  Such 
belief  is  not  the  result  of  logical  reasoning 
(although  accumulating  experience  may 
make  it  increasingly  probable);  it  is  an 
affirmation  of  will.  But,  although  only  a 
postulate,  it  transforms  a  succession  of 
sensations  into  the  consciousness  of  a 
world  of  objects.  It  is,  in  fact,  man's 
will  giving  him  a  world.  The  contents  of 
this  world  are  many  and  varied;  its  ob- 
jects vary  with  diflferent  races  of  men  and 
according  as  the  natural  environment  of 
these  different  groups  varies.  Yet  there 
is  a  limit  to  this  variation;  for  all  men 
possess  the  same  fundamental  instincts 
and  consequently  come  to  value  the  same 
general  sorts  of  objects.  The  objects  in 
question  are  both  animate  and  inanimate. 
In  the  latter  class  fall  all  the  objects  of 
the  physical  environment  which  have  a 
bearing  upon  man's  existence  and  comfort, 
such    as    fruits    and    minerals,    wells    and 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  69 

streams,  plains  and  mountains,  sun,  cloud, 
and  rain.  To  the  former  belong  both 
animals  and  men:  the  first  thought  of  as 
supplying  food  and  clothing,  the  second 
apprehended  in  the  momentous  social  re- 
lationships of  sex,  parenthood,  and  clan- 
ship. The  world  which  the  human  will 
creates  in  its  first  grapple  with  the  con- 
ditions which  confront  it  is  thus  a  world 
of  different  things  which  possess  char- 
acteristic qualities.  These  things  are  con- 
ceived as  centres  of  activity,  as  substances, 
each  displaying  its  own  nature  in  distinc- 
tive attributes — and,  in  their  aggregate, 
they  constitute  the  primitive  world. 

Simple  though  the  structure  of  this 
primitive  world  may  be,  it  is  the  product 
of  two  different  modes  of  thought:  the 
object  which  first  confronts  the  human 
will  is  really  a  combination  of  interpre- 
tations made  from  two  different  points  of 
view.  In  the  first  place,  the  human  in- 
dividual who  would  act  must  apprehend 
objects  in  terms  of  the  bodily  movements 


70         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

required  to  approach  (or  avoid)  them. 
Thus  objects  are  perceived  to  the  right 
and  left,  as  high  or  low,  as  near  or  far,  as 
stationary  or  moving;  they  are  located  in 
space.  Now  the  movements  which  must 
be  made  to  obtain  two  different  objects 
are  never,  at  any  one  time,  just  the  same; 
as  we  say,  no  two  bodies  can  occupy  the 
same  position  in  space  at  the  same  time. 
Hence  the  perceived  location  of  the  single 
object  in  space  belongs  to  it  alone  and  is 
shared  by  no  other.  And  since  the  move- 
ments which  two  or  more  different  in- 
dividuals must  make  to  obtain  the  same 
objects  are  never  just  the  same  (two  hu- 
man bodies  cannot  occupy  the  same  space 
at  the  same  time),  the  perception  of  ob- 
jects as  located  in  space  is  always,  strictly 
speaking,  an  individual  matter.  Yet  for 
small  groups  living  in  close  proximity  the 
location  of  different  objects  is  practically 
the  same.  Their  knowledge  of  the  posi- 
tion of  the  things  that  concern  them  is 
in   a   large   measure   common   knowledge: 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  71 

for  all  of  them  the  neighboring  hilltop  is 
high,  the  plain  is  wide,  the  ocean  far  toward 
the  setting  sun;  for  all  the  region  of  game 
is  identical,  the  stream  containing  fish 
runs  in  the  same  direction.  But,  in  the 
second  place,  the  human  being  who  chooses 
objects  for  pursuit  must  conceive  them 
also  in  terms  of  the  satisfactions  they  are 
able  to  afford  him.  Thus  he  is  led  roughly 
to  classify  objects  according  to  their  qual- 
ities— ^berries  and  flesh  as  good  to  eat, 
spring-water  as  clear  and  cool  to  drink, 
the  skins  of  animals  as  warm  to  wear. 
Now,  since  the  same  satisfactions  are  fur- 
nished by  many  different  objects  (many 
kinds  of  food  are  edible,  many  kinds  of 
skins  are  warm  and  dry)  they  do  not  as 
qualities  belong,  like  location  in  space, 
to  particular  objects  only,  but  are  com- 
mon to  many.  They  are  universals,  are 
characteristics  of  classes  of  objects.  Thus 
every  object  that  is  sought  as  an  end  by 
human  volition  unites  both  existence  in 
particular   time   and   place    and   value  in 


72  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

the  possession   of  certain  desirable  quali- 
ties. 

It  follows  that  the  action  required  to 
obtain  the  object  of  will  in  the  first  stage 
of  its  development  is  peculiar  to  the  in- 
dividual. To  go  to  drink  from  the  spring 
near  by  requires  a  different  combination 
of  bodily  movements  from  every  member 
of  the  clan.  These  movements  cannot  be 
described  in  general  terms  (not  completely 
by  our  modern  science  and  scarcely  at  all 
by  primitive  thought).  They  can,  how- 
ever, be  imitated,  and  when  to  such  imita- 
tion is  added  some  elementary  instruction 
through  the  medium  of  language,  action 
begins  to  be  generalized  and  standardized. 
Thus  the  clan  learns  to  hunt  together,  to 
fight  together,  to  build  by  common  action 
some  rude  shelter.  The  ends  of  action, 
on  the  other  hand,  are  in  a  measure  com- 
mon to  different  individuals  from  the  start. 
For  much  the  same  satisfactions  are  sought 
by  all  men  because  their  instinctive  de- 
sires are  identical  and  the  quality  of  fur- 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  73 

nishing  such  satisfaction  belongs  not  to 
single  objects  but  to  classes  of  objects. 
Hence  all  the  group  may  together  seek 
and  enjoy  food,  obtaining  it  in  diflferent 
ways  from  different  sources.  When  in 
the  development  of  language  names  are 
given  to  these  universal  qualities  and  they 
become  the  subject  of  discourse  the  founda- 
tion of  intelligent  social  life  is  laid.  Thus 
values  are  from  the  beginning  social,  and 
the  social  consciousness  is  originally  a 
consciousness  of  value.  This  is  a  neces- 
sary result  of  the  fact  that,  while  the  cir- 
cumstances of  human  existence  vary  end- 
lessly, and  the  modes  of  human  action 
differ  without  limit,  a  unity  of  will  underlies 
all  human  life  in  consequence  of  which 
men  have  common  ends  and  desires. 

The  outcome  of  the  activity  which  we 
have  been  considering,  wherein  the  human 
individual  seeks  through  his  own  bodily 
effort  to  secure  the  object  which  he  at 
the  moment  desires,  is  a  succession  of  en- 
joyments.    This  is  the  case,  providing,  of 


74         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

course,  he  is  able  to  obtain  the  objects 
which  he  seeks,  that  his  actions  are  suc- 
cessful in  yielding  the  satisfaction  sought 
for.  Now,  it  is  not  impossible  that  the 
succession  of  desires  should,  for  a  consid- 
erable time,  gain  fulfilment;  for,  as  the 
child  who  is  favorably  situated  may  live 
a  life  of  care-free  delight  or  sunny  enjoy- 
ment, now  playing,  now  eating,  now  rest- 
ing, as  it  pleases  him,  so  Nature  may  prove 
an  indulgent  foster-parent,  permitting  her 
human  children  to  enjoy  an  almost  un- 
broken round  of  pleasure  in  the  gratifica- 
tion of  succeeding  desires.  Feeling  may, 
therefore,  be  said  to  be  the  dominant  factor 
in  the  natural  life  of  man:  the  will  which 
we  have  seen  to  be  its  source  here  strives 
to  secure  and  prolong  present  pleasure 
and  to  escape  the  pain  which  momentarily 
threatens.  The  pleasures  sought  and  en- 
joyed are  not  merely  those  which  arise 
from  organic  well-being  and  betterment, 
however.  These  play  an  important  part, 
to  be  sure,  but  to  them  is  added  the  plea- 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  75 

sure  which  comes  from  the  successful  at- 
tainment of  an  object  with  which  the  will 
of  the  individual  has  identified  itself,  from 
the  unimpeded  exercise  of  the  will  itself. 
Thus  the  savage,  who  obtains  the  game 
which  he  hunts,  enjoys  not .  merely  the 
beneficial  effects  of  the  food  which  it  pro- 
vides but  also  his  own  success  in  the  hunt- 
ing. The  satisfaction  which  he  gains  is 
not  to  be  understood  as  simply  a  pleasant 
feeling  which  tones  the  consciousness  of 
a  living  organism  which  has  been  affected 
beneficially;  it  is  a  composite,  a  concrete 
consciousness,  a  pleasure  which  results 
from  the  successful  appropriation  of  an 
object  which  proves  to  have  just  those 
qualities  for  which  it  was  chosen  and 
sought.  Indeed,  it  is  possible  for  an  action 
momentarily  detrimental  to  man's  phys- 
ical well-being,  to  yield  pleasure  when 
attained,  because  his  will  has  identified 
itself  with  just  this  object.  Thus  a  savage 
might  enjoy  winning  a  race  which  he  upon 
impulse  had  run  with  a  fellow  despite  the 


76          FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

fact    he    was    suffering    great    momentary 
pain  in  result  of  his  unwonted  exertions. 

While  it  is  possible  that  action  from 
momentary  desire  should  bring  an  unbroken 
succession  of  pleasures,  it  is  exceedingly 
improbable.  The  conditions  of  man's  exis- 
tence on  this  earth  are  such  as  to  make  it 
practically  impossible  for  him  always  to 
succeed  in  obtaining  what  he  at  the  mo- 
ment desires.  Objects  fail  to  yield  the 
expected  satisfactions:  the  well  proves  to 
be  dry,  the  fruit  to  be  bitter,  the  game  to 
have  migrated.  Fellow  humans  fail  to 
exhibit  the  looked-for  traits:  the  trusted 
helper  becomes  the  jealous  rival,  the  ad- 
miring companion  becomes  the  scornful 
critic,  the  friendly  acquaintance  becomes 
the  vengeful  foe.  And  when  the  objects 
sought  after  retain  their  pleasure-giving 
qualities  the  forces  of  nature  are  liable  at 
any  time  unexpectedly  to  interfere  and 
frustrate  all  man's  efforts  to  attain  them. 
In  fact,  the  life  absorbed  in  the  pursuit  of 
present  pleasure  exists,  when  it  exists  at 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  77 

all,  on  suflferance  of  nature;  the  existence 
of  those  peoples  who  live  entirely  in  the 
present  and  take  little  thought  for  the  fu- 
ture is  notoriously  precarious.  The  sword 
hanging  over  their  heads  may  have  its 
slender  thread  cut  instantly  by  any  one  of 
a  score  of  perils,  such  as  famine,  pestilence, 
storm,  wild  beasts,  or  human  foes,  and 
the  best  that  can  be  said  for  them  is  that 
their  death  when  it  comes  may  be  merci- 
fully swift,  sudden,  and  unexpected. 

Just  here,  in  this  thwarting  of  man's 
will  in  its  efforts  to  secure  the  object  which 
at  the  moment  appeals  to  it,  enters  evily 
the  tragic  feature  in  human  life.  Under 
the  head  of  evil  is  included  all  the  influ- 
ences and  tendencies  arising  out  of  the 
actual  conditions  of  human  life  that  hin- 
der or  frustrate  man's  will  in  its  efforts 
at  self -expansion.  In  the  very  first  stage 
of  human  progress,  when  man's  will  ex- 
presses itself  in  effort  to  gratify  present 
desire,  evil  is  present  unmistakably  and 
ominously  in  its  two  characteristic  forms. 


78          FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

It  appears,  first,  as  the  failure  of  physical 
forces  and  objects  to  meet  human  expec- 
tations and  to  fulfil  human  needs.  Sec- 
ondly, it  appears  as  the  failure  of  other 
human  beings  to  afford  the  satisfactions 
which  the  individual's  social  instincts  cause 
him  to  expect  from  them,  and  this  because 
they  as  individuals  have  desires  of  their 
own  which  they  are  seeking  to  gratify. 
The  will  of  the  human  individual  comes 
inevitably  into  conflict,  first,  with  the  forces 
of  nature,  second,  with  other  human  wills: 
in  the  first  conflict  consists  natural  or  phys- 
ical, in  the  second,  moral  or  social  evil. 

It  would  appear,  then,  that  man's  world 
fails  from  the  beginning  to  justify  the 
faith  he  has  put  in  it.  Accepted  modes  of 
action  do  not  result  in  the  attainment  of 
the  desired  object  as  was  expected,  and 
objects  when  attained  do  not  manifest 
the  quahties  ascribed  to  them.  How  does 
the  will  react  to  this  emergency.^  By  sur- 
rendering its  faith  and  sinking  back  into 
the  quiescence  of  discouragement  and  de- 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  79 

spair  ?  Not  at  all !  Volition's  response  is 
characteristic  of  its  dauntless  courage,  its 
inexhaustible  resource.  To  this  crisis  it 
responds  with  another  beUef  more  venture- 
some and  far-reaching  than  the  first.  It 
assumes  that  the  objects  of  desire  are  con- 
trolled by  superhuman  spirits  who  are 
susceptible  to  its  influence,  responsive  to 
its  appeal.  The  will  of  man  proposes  to 
insure  itself  of  the  satisfaction  which  it 
seeks  by  winning  the  favor  and  enlisting 
the  strength  of  the  spirits  who  control 
the  objects  of  its  desires.  Thus  the  savage 
believes  that  the  spring  gone  dry  can  be 
made  to  gush  forth  water  if  by  prayer, 
adulation,  or  sacrifice  he  can  gain  the 
ear  and  secure  the  assistance  of  its  pre- 
siding divinity.  Hence  he  is  led  to  take 
the  measures  which  seem  to  be  required 
in  the  way  of  rehgious  rite  and  ceremony 
to  insure  himself  of  success  in  the  hunt, 
victory  in  the  fight,  children  in  marriage. 

At  this  juncture,  then,  we  behold  relig- 
ion entering  the  world  of  human  experi- 


80  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

ence — ^religion,  a  factor  of  determining  im- 
portance in  man's  life,  an  essential  feature 
in  his  progress.  In  its  earliest  and  simplest 
form  religious  faith  consists  in  belief  in 
the  existence  of  agencies  possessing  more 
power  than  man  possesses,  because  they 
are  able  to  control  actual  objects  and  forces 
in  a  way  that  he  cannot,  and  also  having 
personality  since  they  are  capable  of  under- 
standing man's  petitions  and  sympathizing 
with  his  desires  and  acting  to  fulfil  his 
needs.  The  gods  are,  therefore,  from  the 
beginning  conceived  as  spirits.  With  the 
origin  of  man's  belief  in  spirits,  invisible 
personal  agents,  we  are  not  here  concerned. 
Probably  a  number  of  influences  con- 
tributed to  the  formation  of  this  belief. 
But  these  spirits  become  objects  of  relig- 
ious faith  only  when  they  are  controlling 
factors  in  conduct,  when  they  are  utilized 
as  instrumentalities  by  volition  in  the 
achievement  of  its  ends.  Then  the  gods 
become  man's  helpers  and  protectors,  co- 
operating with  his  will  in  its  eflFort  to  en- 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  81 

large  the  scope  of  his  personaUty  by  giv- 
ing him  control  over  physical  objects 
and  forces,  and  over  the  psychical  states 
of  himself  and  his  fellow  men.  The  at- 
tribute of  divinity  most  prominent  in  the 
infancy  of  religion  is  undoubtedly  power. 
The  gods  are  necessarily  many,  since  the 
objects  which  affect,  favorably  or  unfavor- 
ably, the  fulfilment  of  man's  desires  are 
many  and  diverse.  There  are  gods  of  the 
forest  and  the  stream,  of  the  mountain 
and  the  storm,  of  the  fight  and  the  hunt, 
of  feasting  and  procreation.  These  divin- 
ities may  be  imagined  in  the  forms  of 
familiar  animals  but  they  always  pos- 
sess personal  powers  not  attributed  to  any 
animal.  Since,  moreover,  human  desires 
have  source  in  instincts  common  to  all 
men,  and  the  primitive  group  or  clan  seeks 
to  gratify  these  desires  in  a  common  nat- 
ural environment,  the  same  divinities  an- 
swer for  the  whole  group.  Religion  is, 
therefore,  a  social  institution  from  the. 
start.     As  the  gods  possess  the  essential 


82  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

attributes  of  personality  the  methods  of 
persuading,  beguiling,  and  (occasionally) 
threatening  them  are  identical  with  those 
used  in  dealing  with  fellow  men.  Petitions 
are  addressed  to  them,  they  are  eulogized 
and  cajoled,  gifts  are  presented,  bribes 
are  oflFered,  bargains  are  made.  Since 
they  are  gods  of  the  whole  group,  and  the 
objects  they  control  are  desired  by  all 
and  frequently  sought  by  common  efiFort, 
their  worship  tends  to  become  a  social 
ceremony  and  a  symbol  of  group  unity. 

Even  with  the  reinforcement  of  religious 
belief  the  effort  of  man's  will  to  obtain 
satisfaction  through  the  pursuit  of  the 
objects  of  momentary  desire  is  doomed  to 
failure.  It  may  be  diflBcult  to  understand 
how  religion  in  this  crude  form  could  give 
any  real  assistance.  How,  may  we  ask, 
could  man  ever  so  deceive  himself  as  to 
believe  that  his  prayers  and  sacrifices 
would  bring  him  success  in  the  hunt  or  the 
fight  .'^  Surely  his  experience  would  soon 
teach  him  that  the  actual  course  of  events 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  83 

proceeded  quite  uninfluenced  by  his  at- 
tempts to  secure  divine  interposition  in 
his  favor.  But  we  must  not  forget  that  it 
is  precisely  this  actual  course  of  events  of 
which  primitive  man  is  most  densely  ig- 
norant. As  the  game  suddenly  and  mys- 
teriously disappeared  from  its  accustomed 
haunts,  just  so  suddenly  and  mysteriously 
it  might  return.  What  more  natural,  then, 
than  to  ascribe  its  return  to  the  interfer- 
ence of  a  friendly  deity  .^^  The  persistence 
and  value  of  religion  at  this  stage  is  not 
due,  to  be  sure^  to  any  intervention  in  the 
processes  of  nature  made  on  man's  behalf 
by  his  gods.  Never,  we  know  very  well, 
was  a  single  human  desire  fulfilled  through 
a  control  of  the  natural  conditions  exercised 
by  these  imaginary  beings.  But  faith  in 
their  existence  and  power  enabled  primitive 
man  to  keep  faith  in  himself,  in  the  power 
of  his  personal  will,  and  in  this  lay  the 
value  of  his  religion.  It  gave  him  the 
strength  and  courage  to  keep  on  trying  in 
the  face  of  disappointment,  failure,  disas- 


84         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

ter.  Religion  is  here  (as  always)  the  will's 
affirmation  of  confidence  in  itself,  in  the 
power  of  personality  and  its  ability  ulti- 
mately to  achieve  that  reality  for  which 
it  yearns. 

Despite  the  essentially  unsatisfactory  and 
ineffective  character  of  the  primitive  life 
and  the  moral  necessity  for  transcending 
it,  this  way  of  living  is,  nevertheless,  the 
genuine  starting-point  of  man's  progress 
and,  as  such,  is  rooted  permanently  in  our 
human  nature.  The  more  highly  organ- 
ized and  comprehensive  types  of  life  which 
have  replaced  it  are  maintained  only  by 
continuous  exertion  of  the  will,  and  period- 
ically we  grow  tired  of  exercising  this 
power — of  the  strain  of  holding  the  atten- 
tion fixed  upon  a  remote  and  imaginary 
goal,  of  the  effort  of  adjustment  and  con- 
trivance required  to  fit  the  vivid,  urgent 
present,  with  its  demand  for  instant  grati- 
fication, into  the  scheme  or  pattern  pre- 
scribed by  the  visionary  ideal.  In  such 
periods  of  moral  fatigue  we  tend  to  relax 


THE  PRIMITIVE  LIFE  85 

into  the  primitive  mode  of  life,  to  abandon 
ourselves  to  the  governance  of  passing 
impulse.  Nay,  more  than  this,  the  legiti- 
mate holidays  that  we  all  must  take  are 
necessarily  of  this  character;  for  a  time 
we  allow  ourselves  to  be  absorbed  in  grati- 
fying momentary  desire,  with  the  pre- 
caution that  such  pleasures  as  we  may 
thus  enjoy  do  not  interfere  seriously  with 
the  larger  enterprises  to  which  we  have 
committed  ourselves.  Thus  we  relax  in  a 
holiday  at  the  seashore  (to  choose  a 
casual  instance),  losing  ourselves  in  the 
sensations  of  the  moment  and  heeding  no 
influence  but  the  call  of  passing  desire, 
now  walking  on  the  sand,  now  taking 
a  plunge  in  the  surf,  now  resting  on  a  hill 
in  view  of  the  sea,  now  sailing  toward  the 
distant  island.  On  such  days  it  is  not 
difficult  to  relapse  into  the  animism  of 
our  primitive  ancestors:  we  seem  to  feel 
the  spirit  of  the  sea,  now  sunny  and  caress- 
ing, now  brooding  and  sullen,  now  violent 
and    implacable;     we    could    worship    the 


86          FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

sun  in  his  serene  and  lofty  course  as  the 
source  of  heat  and  light  and  growth;  the 
voice  of  the  wind  becomes  almost  articulate 
with  messages  from  far-away  shores;  the 
white  sails  of  the  distant  ship  seem  ani- 
mated even  as  the  outstretched  wings  of 
the  soaring  gull.  ^ 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  NATURAL  LIFE 

In  the  course  of  time  man  discovers 
another  way  of  obtaining  the  object  of 
his  desire,  more  eflfective  (if  not  easier) 
than  invoking  the  power  of  its  protecting 
divinity.  This  is  to  observe  and  to  avail 
himself  of  the  regular  sequences  of  nature, 
thus  utilizing  natural  processes  and  em- 
ploying natural  forces.  From  the  begin- 
ning men  seem  to  have  had  a  vague  notion 
of  the  existence  of  impersonal  forces  which 
controlled  the  objects  of  their  world  in 
a  manner  quite  different  from  the  personal 
influence  exerted  by  divine  spirits:  the 
arts  of  magic  believed  in  and  practised  by 
primitive  people  are  proof  of  this.  But 
such  physical  influence  was  so  much  less 
familiar  than  the  control  of  nature  by 
spirit  which  the  earliest  human  experience 
appeared  to  illustrate,  and  promised  assis- 

87 


88         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

tance  so  much  less  certain  and  immediate, 
that  its  possibilities  were  almost  entirely 
overlooked  in  the  hope  of  securing  instant 
relief  through  divine  interposition.  But 
man  could  not  remain  for  long  blind  to 
the  regular  succession  of  events  in  nature. 
He  must  soon  notice  that  the  green  fruit 
preceded  the  ripe,  and  that  both  followed 
upon  bud  and  blossom;  he  would  observe 
that  the  growth  and  decay  of  vegetation 
followed  the  order  of  the  seasons;  he  would 
also  see  that  the  same  seasonal  rhythm 
governed  the  movements  of  animals,  their 
mating  and  reproduction,  their  migration 
and  change  of  covering;  nor  could  the 
effect  of  such  physical  influences  as  heat 
and  cold  upon  the  skins  he  wore,  the  food 
he  ate,  the  water  he  drank  entirely  escape 
him. 

To  take  practical  advantage  of  these 
regular  sequences  of  natural  process  seems 
to  us  a  simple  step;  but  to  primitive  man, 
groping  his  way  in  a  strange  world,  the 
step  was  not  easy  nor  to  be  taken  quickly. 


THE  NATUEAL  LIFE  89 

The  hoarding  instinct  which  man  shares 
to  some  extent  with  the  lower  animals 
would  encourage  him  to  dry  and  store 
grains  and  herbs  for  the  coming  winter 
or  to  await  the  migratory  movements  of 
the  animals  in  summer  and  autumn  in 
order  to  secure  meat  sufficient  for  the 
months  when  they  are  absent,  as  the 
northern  Indians  hunt  and  kill  the  seal 
and  caribou.  Indeed,  such  provision  for 
food  and  clothing  and  shelter  during  the 
cold  and  lean  months  of  winter  is  the  con- 
dition of  human  existence  in  the  upper 
temperate  and  subarctic  regions.  It  is 
still  a  long  step,  to  be  sure,  from  such  en- 
forced following  upon  the  regular  sequences 
of  nature  to  the  intelligent  employment 
of  natural  processes  to  secure  a  purposed 
result,  such  as  we  find  in  systematic  agri- 
culture and  animal  husbandry.  How  this 
further  step  was  taken  need  not  concern 
us,  although  we  may  indulge  our  fancy 
by  imagining  how  it  may  have  been.  A 
handful    of    grain    scattered    by    accident 


90         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

upon  some  soft  and  broken  ground  near 
the  encampment  in  winter  or  spring  would 
result  in  the  growth  of  the  familiar  plant 
the  succeeding  summer;  such  growth  with 
the  ripening  fruit  would  be  connected  in 
observant  and  retentive  minds  with  the 
scattered  seed;  an  enterprising  individual 
would  be  prompted  to  experiment  the 
next  season  by  planting  some  grain  he 
had  carefully  saved  for  the  purpose.  Or 
an  animal,  perhaps  wounded,  would  be 
captured  alive  in  the  hunt;  some  whim  of 
its  captors  or,  maybe,  real  sympathy  for 
its  suflfering  and  terror  would  lead  them  to 
relieve  its  pain,  feed  and  fondle  it;  in  the 
course  of  its  gradual  recovery  it  would  be 
tamed  and  made  submissive  to  the  weight 
of  man  or  child  upon  its  back  or  to  the 
tension  and  pull  of  the  harness  attaching 
it  to  cart  or  sledge.  In  some  such  way, 
we  fancy,  the  first  beginnings  were  made 
in  tilling  the  soil  and  in  the  care  and  use 
of  animals. 

When  man,  in  effort  to  provide  for  com- 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  91 

ing  needs,  seeks  ends  which  lie  in  the  future 
and  not  in  the  present,  he  rises  to  a  higher 
plane  of  achievement;  he  lays  the  founda- 
tion for  a  more  comprehensive  life.  This 
larger  life  has  also  its  source  in  volition.  It 
is,  in  fact,  just  a  further  expression  of  will: 
the  will  to  have  a  life  not  confined  to  the 
present  moment  but  extending  over  and 
uniting  a  succession  of  moments,  the  will 
to  have  a  world  not  of  single  objects  merely 
but  of  regularly  ordered  events  and  uni- 
formly acting  forces.  Arising  as  the  crea- 
tion of  his  own  will  as  it  encounters  objec- 
tive conditions,  this  new  world  costs  man 
both  effort  and  suffering;  for  future  com- 
fort is  secured  only  by  present  toil,  future 
suffering  is  prevented  only  by  present  pri- 
vation, and  thus  to  resist  present  desire 
and  to  forego  the  certain  pleasure  of  its 
gratification  requires  an  effort  greater  than 
any  made  hitherto.  The  larger  life  calls 
for  a  greater  faith,  the  larger  world  in- 
volves more  hazardous  adventure.  It  is 
necessary   to  remind   ourselves   somewhat 


92         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

forcibly  of  this  fact,  since  through  train- 
ing and  social  experience,  foresight  and 
prudence  have  become  so  habitual  with 
us  that  we  are  apt  to  forget  that  pro- 
vision for  the  future  springs  originally 
from  faith,  not  knowledge,  that  confidence 
in  the  uniform  operation  of  natural  forces 
is  primarily  an  act  of  will  rather  than  the 
counsel  of  reason.  Faith  must  be  exer- 
cised because  that  future  welfare  to  which 
man  must  sacrifice  the  desire  of  the  pres- 
ent exists,  at  the  time  when  the  sacrifice 
has  to  be  made,  only  as  an  idea  in  his  imag- 
ination. To  this  idea,  to  his  ideal  of  a 
future  life,  man  must  attribute  a  reality 
superior  to  that  possessed  by  the  present 
in  which  he  actually  exists.  Such  reality 
he  can  give  to  his  ideal  future  only  through 
an  act  of  will,  and  in  such  act  of  will,  as- 
serting the  reality  of  the  unperceived  and 
unactual,  consists  faith.  Of  course,  thought, 
interpreting  past  experience,  may  approve 
of  such  faith.  Certainly  faith,  to  be  ef- 
fective,  must  be  based   upon   knowledge. 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  93 

must  go  as  far  as  possible  under  its  gui- 
dance, and  must  never  run  counter  to  it. 
But  knowledge  can  never  justify  such  con- 
fidence in  an  imagined  future,  can  never 
prove  that  this  possesses  a  reality  equal  or 
superior  to  that  possessed  by  the  actual 
present.  In  the  final  reckoning,  the  future 
of  any  human  individual  must  remain,  as 
far  as  his  knowledge  is  concerned,  un- 
certain. Our  knowledge  enables  us  to  fore- 
cast the  future  with  remarkable  accuracy, 
but  does  not  guarantee  it;  all  the  science 
of  civilized  man  does  not  enable  him  to 
predict  with  assurance  what  his  future  will 
be  ten  years  ahead,  one  year  ahead,  one 
month,  one  week,  one  day  ahead.  The 
universe  is  so  vast,  its  possibilities  are  so 
many  and  varied,  that  the  element  of  con- 
tingency cannot  be  expelled  from  human 
life:  always  uncertainty  will  remain,  al- 
ways the  unexpected  will  happen.  There- 
fore, to  sacrifice  a  present  which,  for  all  its 
limitations,  actually  exists — vividly,  insis- 
tently, exists — and  promises  certain  satis- 


94  FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

faction,  for  the  sake  of  a  future  which  the 
fullest  knowledge  must  leave  uncertain  is 
in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  word,  to  venture; 
it  calls  for  genuine  courage.     But,  some  one 
may  interpose,  even  the  animals,  without 
the  intelligence  which  enables  man  to  fore- 
see and  plan,  provide  to  some  extent  for 
their  own  future;    they  build  shelters  and 
store  food  for  the  coming  winter.     Surely 
such  provision  for  future  needs  is  not  to 
be  reckoned  a  great  achievement  on  man's 
part!     Yes,  but  the  operation  of  instinct 
in  the  case  of  such  animals  converts  pro- 
vision for  future  need  into  a  present  im- 
pulse whose  indulgence  furnishes  immediate 
pleasure.    And  man's  intelligence,  while  it 
unrolls  the  curtain  of  the  future  a  little 
way  for  him,  also  reveals  to  him  what  the 
animal  never  knows — ^the  vicissitudes  and 
uncertainties  of  earthly  existence,  the  im- 
minence of  disaster  and  death,  the  tran- 
siency of  mortal  life.     No,  man's  reason 
seems  at  times  to  justify  him  in  snatching 
at  the  delights  of  the  flying  present,  for- 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  95 

getting  if  he  can  the  perils  of  the  future. 
Certainly  intelligence  does  not  give  to 
man  the  fuller  life  to  which  he  aspires, 
nature  does  not  present  him  with  the 
larger  world  for  which  he  yearns.  These 
must  come  through  labor  of  spirit,  through 
the  "slow,  dead  heave  of  the  will":  man 
must  walk  by  faith;  he  must  have  the 
courage  to  grapple  with  his  own  future. 

The  expansion  of  the  boundaries  of 
human  personality  to  include  the  future 
along  with  the  present  and  past,  we  thus 
see  to  be  the  work  of  volition.  It  rests 
upon  a  postulate  of  rational  will,  the  sec- 
ond which  is  implied  in  man's  personal 
development,  the  postulate  that  events  occur 
in  fixed  sequences  which  when  followed  out 
enable  man  to  provide  for  his  own  future 
comfort  and  safety.  This  is  belief  in  the 
uniformity  of  natural  processes  as  seen 
in  their  bearing  upon  human  action.  A 
recognition  of  the  fixed  order  in  which 
events  actually  occur  makes  it  possible 
for  the  human  individual  to  utiHze  objects 


96         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

existing  in  the  present  as  means  which 
may  be  depended  upon  to  produce  pur- 
posed results  in  the  future.  Thus  man  is 
led  to  transfer  the  power  to  produce  re- 
sults which  he  feels  in  himself  to  these 
existing  objects  and  they  become  for  him 
causes.  The  postulate  which  we  are  con- 
sidering is,  of  course,  no  other  than  the 
principle  of  causality.  The  uniformity  of 
operation  which  this  principle  posits  has 
a  double  application,  to  outer,  or  physical, 
and  to  inner,  or  psychical,  events.  Applied 
to  the  physical  world,  it  means  the  dis- 
covery and  acknowledgment  of  the  more 
obvious  and,  in  a  sense,  fundamental  se- 
quences of  nature:  those  pertaining  to 
the  seasons  and  the  weather,  of  the  sun  as 
causing  light  and  warmth,  of  sultry  heat 
as  followed  by  cloud  and  thunder,  of  cloud 
as  bringing  rain;  the  sequences  of  plant  and 
animal  life,  such  as  germination,  growth, 
fruition,  and  decay;  the  action  of  the  fa- 
miliar materials,  like  wood,  stone,  skins, 
and  finally  metal,  under  diverse  conditions, 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  97 

such  as  heat  and  cold,  pressure  and  strain. 
Uniformities  are  at  the  same  time  ob- 
served in  the  behavior  of  human  beings. 
The  sequences  here  perceived  and  utihzed 
are  really  of  psychical  events,  although,  to 
be  sure,  psychical  and  physical  processes 
have  not  as  yet  been  clearly  distinguished. 
Certain  impulses  are  seen  invariably  to 
produce  certain  movements;  the  leading 
motives  of  human  conduct  are  singled  out 
and  connected  each  with  its  characteristic 
expression.  Anger  is  recognized  as  the 
cause  of  assault  and  blows,  fear  the  cause 
of  flight,  lust  as  the  cause  of  intrigue  and 
abduction;  love,  moreover,  is  seen  to  re- 
sult in  loyalty  and  service,  avarice  in  the 
accumulation  of  property  and  the  harden- 
ing of  the  heart,  indolence  in  poverty  and 
dishonesty.  Thus  we  find  a  nascent  recog- 
nition of  the  two  great  types  of  causal  re- 
lationship: the  mechanical  in  the  action 
of  physical  forces,  and  free  agency  in  hu- 
man behavior. 

Upon  these  observed  sequences  in  the 


98         FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

action  of  physical  objects  and  of  human 
beings  is  based  a  way  of  hving  which  we 
may  call  the  natm'al  life — natural,  because 
it  is  engaged  in  utilizing  familiar  forces 
of  nature  to  preserve  man's  natural  exis- 
tence and  secure  his  physical  comfort.  This 
has  been  the  dominant  mode  of  living  among 
men  since  the  dawn  of  human  history;  it 
is  still  the  typical  human  Ufe,  Uved  by  the 
great  majority  in  Asia,  by  the  peasantry 
of  Europe,  and  the  most  of  the  rural  pop- 
ulation of  America.  In  fact,  until  the 
modern  industrial  system  took  its  rise,  this 
mode  of  life  was  lived  by  all  mankind  ex- 
cept tribes  of  savages  on  the  one  hand 
and  that  comparatively  small  fraction  on 
the  other  which,  through  favoring  circum- 
stances or  superior  intellectual  endowment, 
had  escaped  its  limitations  and  at  the 
same  time  lost  its  substantial  benefits. 
It  is  the  life  which  follows  the  rhythm  of 
the  seasons,  expanding  into  vigorous  out- 
door activity  when  the  warm  spring  sun 
thaws  the  frost  from  the  ground  and  dis- 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  99 

solves  with  its  genial  rays  the  icy  shackles 
which  have  bound  brook  and  stream  and 
contracting  within  doors  to  the  sedentary 
occupations  of  the  fireside  when  the  frost  re- 
turns in  the  late  autumn  and  the  wind  blows 
bitter-cold  over  the  snow-covered  fields. 
It  is  the  life  which  is  rooted  in  the  soil, 
the  life  of  sowing  and  of  reaping,  of  spring 
festival  and  of  harvest  home.  Almost 
the  whole  of  its  sustenance  is  drawn  from 
the  soil  which  furnishes  necessary  food, 
and  fuel  for  cooking  and  winter  heat,  and 
materials  for  building  and  tools.  It  is 
the  life  which  depends  upon  the  possession 
and  employment  of  domestic  animals: 
horses,  cattle,  sheep,  goats,  and  poultry 
are  systematically  bred  and  cared  for  in 
order  that  they  may  serve  purposes  of 
transportation  and  draft,  or  may  furnish 
food  and  clothing.  The  stable  is  an  ad- 
junct to  the  house,  the  poultry  populate 
the  dooryard;  the  offal  from  the  stable 
feeds  the  land,  the  soil  in  its  turn  produces 
food  for  man  and  beast.     The  social  Ufe 


100        FAITH  JUSTIFIED^  BY  PROGRESS 

which  has  this  agricultural  setting  consists 
for  the  most  part  of  the  association  of  mem- 
bers of  the  family  and  the  rural  neighbor- 
hood in  the  common  work  of  satisfying 
their  fundamental  physical  needs.  Co- 
operating in  the  toil  of  house  or  of  field, 
participating  in  the  hearty  pleasures  of 
the  family  meal,  the  mutual  enjoyment 
of  the  warm  hearth  and  comfortable  bed, 
if  to  these  common  activities  we  add  those 
which  spring  from  the  sexual  and  social 
instincts,  such  as  courting  and  marrying, 
the  begetting  and  rearing  of  children,  with 
talking  and  jesting,  the  singing  of  songs 
and  the  playing  of  simple  games,  we  have 
taken  account  of  the  main  features  of 
man's  natural  social  life. 

If  we  consider  now  the  activities  by 
which  man  seeks  to  attain  future  comfort 
and  security,  we  find  that  they  differ  in 
important  respects  from  those  by  which 
he  seeks  to  gratify  his  present  desire.  In 
action  from  momentary  desire  which  is 
the    earliest    and    simplest    expression    of 


THE  NATURAL  LIFfe'  ,•;^  •;  ^i?ji :'(;•, 

will  In  man,  the  human  individual  en- 
deavors through  movements  of  his  own 
body  to  gain  possession  of  the  desired 
object.  Such  movements  are  of  necessity 
pecuhar  to  the  individual;  they  follow  from 
his  position  relative  to  the  object,  from 
his  own  physique  and  skill;  they  cannot 
be  generalized  or  reduced  to  rule.  But  the 
activities  by  which  man  endeavors  to  pro- 
vide for  his  future  welfare  are  based  upon 
observed  sequences  of  events.  They  can 
become  matters  of  common  knowledge; 
hence  the  activities  based  upon  them  can 
become  the  common  practice  of  a  people, 
or  of  mankind.  The  practice  of  agricul- 
ture which  gives  character  to  the  type  of 
human  life  we  are  discussing  well  illus- 
trates this.  Depending  upon  sequences 
of  natural  events  carefully  noted,  the  rota- 
tion of  the  seasons,  the  variation  in  the 
moisture  of  the  soil,  the  stages  in  growth, 
and  so  on,  the  successive  steps  in  this 
activity  are  identical  from  year  to  year, 
and  the  same  with  all  individuals.     The 


/:^a|]^*<iFAI3P^  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

practice  of  agriculture  may  thus  be  re- 
membered and  taught  by  one  generation 
to  the  next;  it  becomes  an  art,  and  as 
such  the  possession  of  a  tribe  or  people. 
Not  being  grounded  in  an  experimental 
analysis  of  the  actual  conditions,  such 
practices  are  not  applicable  by  mankind 
universally;  based  rather  upon  empirical 
generalizations  made  in  particular  regions, 
methods  of  agriculture  may  be  depended 
upon  to  produce  the  results  aimed  at  only 
in  regions  where  conditions  of  soil  and 
climate  are  the  same  or  very  similar.  But 
such  activities,  if  they  cannot  be  uni- 
versalized, can  at  least  be  generalized,  and 
therein  lies  their  superiority  to  earlier  ac- 
tivities which  are  individual  accomplish- 
ments merely. 

Faith  in  uniformities  of  natural  events 
and  of  human  behavior,  a  faith  which  re- 
peated trial  raises  nearer  and  nearer  to 
assurance,  serves  therefore  as  the  founda- 
tion for  the  technic  of  industry  and  of 
government.     In    addition    to    agriculture 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  108 

other  arts  are  developed.  The  sequences 
occurring  in  the  growth,  nourishment,  and 
reproduction  of  animals  constitute,  when 
perceived,  the  basis  of  the  art  of  animal 
husbandry.  The  cooking  of  food,  the 
dressing  of  skins,  the  making  of  weapons, 
the  weaving  of  cloth,  the  building  of  houses 
become  likewise  arts,  each  with  its  estab- 
lished technic.  Transportation  with  hu- 
man or  animal  carriers  and  navigation  of 
a  crude  kind  are  in  their  turn  methodized. 
In  the  sphere  of  government  and  politics 
confidence  in  the  uniform  operation  of 
certain  leading  motives  among  human  be- 
ings makes  possible  an  established  pro- 
cedure which  is,  of  course,  the  essence  of 
political  organization.  It  is  assumed  that 
every  man  will,  on  the  one  hand,  protect 
and  cherish  the  members  of  his  own  imme- 
diate family,  defend  and  seek  to  increase 
his  own  material  possessions,  augment  if 
he  can  his  influence  and  reputation  among 
his  fellows;  while,  on  the  other,  he  will, 
by  every  means  in  his  power,  attempt  to 


104        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

avoid  suflFering  and  death,  the  loss  of 
property,  social  opprobrium,  and  disgrace. 
The  strength  of  these  motives  serves  to 
perpetuate  and  make  effective  the  system 
of  customs  by  which  primitive  society  is 
organized;  later  they  are  relied  upon  to 
secure  the  enforcement  of  law.  Here,  also, 
experience  converts  faith  into  practical 
assurance,  but  there  are  sufficient  excep- 
tions to  make  the  result  uncertain  enough 
when  the  attempt  is  made  to  control  the 
behavior  of  the  individual  human  being. 
Outside  the  authorized  activities  of  govern- 
ment, in  all  the  diverse  associations  of 
men  in  trade  and  industry,  in  the  family 
circle,  and  in  friendly  companionship,  this 
same  faith  is  exercised,  faith  in  the  ef- 
ficacy of  specific  motives,  when  once  in- 
duced, to  produce  definite  and  predictable 
modes  of  behavior;  it  is  the  very  corner- 
stone of  intelligent  social  life.  Yet  how 
often  does  it  fail!  The  son  whom  the 
father  expected  to  arouse  to  instant  and 
continued  industry  by  an  account  of  the 


THE  NATURAX  LIFE  105 

family  need,  or  the  description  of  a  remark- 
able business  opportunity,  surprises  his 
parent  by  showing  no  interest  or  energy 
whatsoever;  he  has  his  own  purposes,  un- 
known to  every  one,  even  his  own  family. 
In  dealing  with  human  beings  who  are 
free  agents,  action  is  doubly  a  venture. 

When  volition  strives  to  extend  its  power 
over  the  future  as  well  as  the  present,  the 
ends  which  it  seeks  are,  of  course,  more 
comprehensive.  True,  the  quality  which 
man  believes  the  object  of  his  momentary 
desire  to  possess  and  on  account  of  which 
he  seeks  this  object  is,  as  we  have  seen,  a 
universal:  this  same  quality  belongs  to 
all  members  of  a  class  of  objects;  it  exists 
as  a  matter  of  common  knowledge  and, 
it  may  be,  of  common  desire  among  dif- 
ferent individuals.  But  when  the  pur- 
poses of  the  human  will  are  enlarged  to 
include  the  future,  the  ends  aimed  at  are 
not  simply  universals,  they  are  groups  of 
universals,  systems  of  qualities.  Consider 
wealth,  for  example,  when  it  is  pursued  as 


106        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

a  provision  for  future  security  and  comfort. 
Its  attainment  means  the  possession  of  a 
multitude  of  objects,  each  of  which  has  its 
characteristic  attributes:  abundant  food, 
handsome  clothing,  ample  holdings  of  land, 
horses  and  cattle,  with  many  other  in- 
cidental objects,  each  offering  its  distinctive 
satisfaction.  The  other  "natural"  goods 
of  man,  such  as  fame,  health,  and  pleasure, 
are  likewise  systems  of  objects,  each  promis- 
ing its  distinctive  satisfaction.  These  more 
inclusive  ends  which  aim  to  cover  and 
provide  for  the  whole  of  man's  natural 
existence  are,  in  the  second  place,  not 
merely  common  to  different  human  in- 
dividuals as  are  the  qualities  of  single 
objects;  they  are,  to  be  sure,  thus  common, 
but  they  are  more  than  this.  They  are 
communal,  that  is,  they  provide  for  the 
satisfaction  or  well-being  of  more  than 
one  individual.  The  others  whose  well- 
being  the  individual  seeks  to  secure  along 
with  his  own  are  primarily  those  of  his 
own  family  and  immediate  circle  of  friends; 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  107 

yet  in  last  analysis  there  is  implied  in  the 
pursuit  of  these  ends  (often  unknown  to, 
and  in  spite  of,  the  agent  himself)  a  regard 
for  the  welfare  of  the  community.  They 
are,  in  fact,  community  ends.  The  man 
who  seeks  wealth  almost  never  seeks  it 
for  himself  alone;  he  wishes  to  support 
his  family,  to  provide  enjoyment  for  his 
friends.  But  suppose  that  he  does  seek 
it  for  his  private  pleasure  merely,  still 
its  continued  and  peaceable  possession  by 
him  would  depend  upon  the  maintenance 
of  law  and  order  in  the  community;  hence 
his  will  to  amass  wealth  for  himself  is  also 
the  will  to  support  at  least  a  rudimentary 
sort  of  order  and  justice  among  his  fellows. 
The  same  is  true  of  fame;  if  it  is  merely 
the  craving  for  self -glory  it  must  will  some 
degree  of  discriminating  intelligence  and 
independent  judgment  to  other  men  or 
else  their  praise  and  adulation  would  seem 
empty  and  worthless.  Of  course,  it  is 
possible  to  press  this  point  too  far.  Wealth 
and  fame  and  pleasure  are  not  universal 


108        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

ideals  like  truth  and  beauty,  whose  at- 
tainment by  any  individual  confers  a  boon 
upon  all  humanity;  their  pursuit  is  often 
radically  and  ruthlessly  selfish.  The  fact 
which  deserves  attention  is  simply  this, 
that  when  man's  purposes  are  enlarged  to 
include  the  whole  period  of  his  natural 
existence,  the  identity  of  human  interests 
is  such  that  his  ends  become  normally 
communal  ends  and  that  no  such  purpose 
is  entirely  without  this  reference  to  the 
welfare  of  the  community  in  which  he 
lives. 

The  natural  life  is  pre-eminently  a  life 
of  action.  If  feeling  dominates  primitive 
human  life,  it  is  action  which  gives  char- 
acter to  the  next  stage  in  human  develop- 
ment. Man  endeavors  to  provide  for  his 
future  well-being  by  unremitting  industry 
in  utilizing  actually  existent  forces  of  nature 
as  means,  which  will,  he  expects,  through 
their  uniform  operation,  produce  this  re- 
sult. He  toils  in  the  field,  in  the  house,  in 
the  workshop;    he,  sows  and  he  reaps,  he 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  109 

subjugates  and  employs  animals,  he  jour- 
neys far  for  materials  and  builds  himself 
houses,  he  dresses  skins  and  weaves  cloth, 
he  constructs  tools  and  weapons.  His  life 
is  spent  in  a  constant  struggle  to  control 
the  forces  of  nature;  he  must  be  vigilant 
as  well  as  industrious,  watchful  and  wary 
to  seize  every  advantage  and  turn  it  to 
his  own  profit.  This  battle  with,  and  con- 
quest of,  the  forces  of  nature  has  left  its 
indelible  mark  upon  human  character:  the 
natural  man  is  a  man  of  action;  he  despises 
any  other  mode  of  life  as  trifling  and  un- 
manly. His  view  of  the  world  alters  to 
suit  the  change  in  his  conduct:  as  his 
own  activity  gains  in  scope  and  efficacy,  his 
world  grows  in  continuity  and  coherence. 
Existing  objects  he  no  longer  conceives  in 
terms  of  the  movements  which  he  and  his 
fellows  must  make  to  approach  and  avoid 
them,  as  a  multitude  of  things  located  in 
space  and  thus  externally  related  to  one 
another.  The  actual  world  he  rather  con- 
ceives as  the  theatre  wh^re  different  forces 


110        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

operate,  forces  which  man  may  rely  upon 
to  produce  certain  results.  Both  physical 
objects  and  human  beings  are  regarded  as 
causal  agencies  whose  behavior  may  be 
predicted  and  hence  depended  upon.  Even 
in  the  sphere  of  values  action  is  upper- 
most. Objects  are  sought  for  the  sake  of 
the  actions  which  they  make  possible. 
Men  seek  to  gain  control  of  more  land  in 
order  that  they  may  raise  more  crops  or 
pasture  more  cattle;  they  build  houses  in 
order  to  provide  places  suitable  for  cook- 
ing and  eating,  for  the  fashioning  of  clothes 
and  the  care  of  children,  for  friendly  con- 
verse and  merrymaking;  they  train  horses 
in  order  that  they  may  ride  or  may  trans- 
port commodities.  A  very  important  dif- 
ference exists,  it  is  true,  between  that  ac- 
tion which  is  sought  as  an  end  and  that 
which  is  employed  as  a  means.  The  action 
by  which  an  object  is  sought  is  necessarily 
determined  in  course  and  character  by  the 
nature  of  that  object  or  other  related  ob- 
jects;   it  consists  in  the  adjustment,  the 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  111 

adaptation,  of  actually  existing  forces  and 
things  to  the  attainment  of  the  purposed 
end;  it  is  essentially  arduous  and  exacting 
— ^is  work.  Into  the  action  which  we  seek 
as  an  end,  on  the  contrary,  the  principle  of 
freedom,  the  element  of  play,  enters:  we 
seek  so  to  enlarge  the  field  of  possibilities 
as  to  be  able  to  act  thus  (or  otherwise) 
according  to  our  choice.  A  man  toils  and 
saves  to  buy  more  land  not  in  order  that 
he  shall  be  compelled  to  put  it  to  a  certain 
use,  but  in  order  that  he  may  use  it  for 
agriculture  or  for  grazing,  for  this  crop 
or  for  that,  as  he  pleases.  Men  work  to 
build  houses  not  solely  for  the  sake  of 
gaining  a  place  where  they  may  continue 
an  arduous  and  compulsory  routine,  but, 
partly  at  least,  in  order  to  have  a  place  so 
sheltered,  so  warm,  so  secure,  that  they 
may  eat,  sleep,  be  sociable,  or  carry  on 
some  other  indoor  occupation,  as  they  see 
fit.  The  action  which  appeals  to  human 
beings  as  worth  while  for  its  own  sake,  and 
is  therefore  sought  as  an  end,  is  5^Z/-deter- 


112        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

mined,  but  this  feature  does  not  bulk  very- 
large  in  the  natural  life  of  man. 

To  overcome  man's  inability  to  secure 
the  necessities  of  natural  existence  by 
means  of  a  more  extensive  effort  whose 
outcome  is  postponed  to  some  future  time 
but  which  sets  going  just  those  forces  that, 
in  the  course  of  their  regular  operation, 
may  be  expected  to  supply  the  need  of 
such  future  time — this  is  the  attempt  of 
human  volition.  By  this  effort  man's 
outlook  has  been  enlarged  to  envisage  the 
future  as  well  as  the  present;  his  life  has 
been  expanded  to  take  in  a  system  of  in- 
teracting forces,  a  community  of  fellow- 
men  behaving  with  characteristic  freedom. 
Thus  volition  asserts  its  power  over  the 
whole  of  man's  natural  life;  it  strives  to 
provide  for  his  security  and  comfort  dur- 
ing the  whole  period  of  his  natural  exis- 
tence. To  this  end  it  finds  several  objects 
instrumental,  and  the  attainment  of  these 
objects  it  takes  for  leading  purposes.  Such 
purposes  are  the  accumulation  of  property. 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  113 

the  care  and  preservation  of  health,  the 
formation  of  reliable  social  ties  in  family 
and  community.  To  the  realization  of 
these  purposes  it  proposes  to  make  every 
act  instrumental.  Has  the  effort  of  man's 
will  to  insure  him  of  a  lifetime  of  secure 
and  comfortable  existence  been  success- 
ful .^^  Has  man's  faith  in  the  uniformity 
of  natural  processes,  his  confidence  in  the 
trustworthiness  of  human  motives,  been 
justified  or  not?  How  has  his  venture 
turned  out.'^  To  these  questions  perhaps 
a  sufficient  answer  is  given  by  the  fact 
that  the  leading  world-religions,  Chris- 
tianity and  Buddhism,  numbering  among 
their  adherents  more  than  half  of  man- 
kind, assume  as  the  axiomatic  basis  of 
their  gospels  that  man's  effort  to  gain  for 
himself  security  and  happiness  in  his  earthly 
existence  is  a  failure,  that  natural  goods 
are  not  worth  pursuing.  Why.^^  Because 
the  forces  of  physical  nature  prove  finally 
to  be  beyond  man's  control  and  the  forces 
of  human  nature  to  be  unaccountable  and 


114        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

treacherous.  Nature  flouts  man's  faith  in 
her  forces,  his  fellow-men  betray  the  con- 
fidence he  has  placed  in  them.  Always 
come  disaster  and  disease,  cruelty  and 
neglect,  old  age  and  death.  The  worm 
lies  at  the  core  of  all  man's  natural 
goods,  the  death's-head  is  present  at  every 
feast. 

Again  the  spectre  of  evil  appears  and 
blocks  the  path  of  volition  in  its  courageous 
advance  to  annex  the  unknown  country 
of  the  future.  To  the  efforts  of  man's 
will  to  organize  his  world,  thus  including 
everything  that  exists  within  the  unity 
of  his  personal  life,  evil  opposes  itself  as 
the  fact  of  ineradicable  maladjustment, 
of  irreconcilable  conflict.  This  stubborn 
opposition  manifests  itself  in  both  natural 
and  social  spheres.  The  forces  of  nature 
prove  to  be — as  far  as  man  can  observe 
and  understand  them — ^incalculable  and 
uncertain;  they  refuse  to  be  controlled, 
to  be  adjusted  to  the  needs  of  human 
existence.      To    the    faithfully    cultivated 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  115 

crops  drouth  comes,  to  the  carefully  tended 
herds  pestilence;  the  result  is  famine  and 
suffering.  Houses  and  barns  intelligently 
planned  and  laboriously  constructed  are 
demolished  in  a  day  by  fire  or  flood.  Whole 
regions,  cleared  and  brought  to  a  state 
of  high  fertility  by  the  work  of  generations, 
with  smiling  fields,  happy  homes,  and 
prosperous  inhabitants,  are  destroyed  by 
volcanic  eruption,  or  laid  waste  by  devastat- 
ing storm.  Disease  strikes  old  and  young, 
and  its  sudden  attacks  cannot  be  foreseen 
or  eflFectually  resisted.  The  man  who,  by 
industry  and  thrift,  has  accumulated  suf- 
ficient property  to  insure  himself  of  a 
comfortable  livelihood  and  to  provide  for 
his  growing  children  is  himself  prematurely 
stricken  with  the  paralysis  of  old  age,  or 
left  desolate  by  the  sudden  death  of  son 
or  daughter. 

In  the  social  sphere,  increased  organiza- 
tion only  brings  into  clearer  relief  the  es- 
sential antagonism  of  men's  natural  in- 
terests.    In  order  to  provide  for  his  own 


116        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

future  needs  and  insure  his  growing  family 
of  the  means  of  subsistence  and  comfort, 
a  man  must  concentrate  his  mind  entirely 
upon  his  own  affairs,  devote  himself  un- 
remittingly to  his  own  task,  and,  in  equal 
measure,  neglect  the  concerns  of  his  fel- 
lows. With  the  development  of  habits  of 
industry  and  thrift  comes  inevitably  some 
degree  of  insensibility  to  the  needs  and 
sufferings  of  others,  of  disregard  for  their 
welfare.  The  careless  generosity  of  prim- 
itive life,  the  open-handed  hospitality  of 
the  savage,  gives  place  to  the  hard  and 
close-fisted  prudence  of  the  industrious 
artisan  or  peasant.  Thrift  and  prudence 
grow  easily  into  avarice,  and  avarice  makes 
men  hard-hearted  and  cruel,  willing  to 
injure  and  oppress  their  fellows,  even  to 
enslave  and  torture  them,  if  through  their 
instrumentality  the  individual  may  in- 
crease his  own  fortunes.  Then  the  pos- 
session and  enjoyment  of  riches  by  the 
industrious,  the  able,  the  fortunate  ex- 
cite the  envy  and  hatred   of  those  who. 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  117 

through  indolence  or  misfortune,  are  suf- 
fering from  lack  of  the  necessities  of  life. 
These  malcontents  are  incited  thereby  to 
deeds  of  violence  against  their  more  pros- 
perous fellows — to  robbery  and  arson  and 
murder.  Nor  is  it  easy  to  see  how  these 
evil  results  which  attend  upon  social  evolu- 
tion could  be  prevented;  for  the  material 
goods  which  the  world  supplies  are  limited 
in  amount,  and  their  accumulation  to  any 
marked  degree  in  the  hands  of  the  few 
means  that  the  many  must  go  without. 

Social  organization  not  merely  brings  to 
light  latent  antagonisms  between  individ- 
uals within  the  group;  it  also  appears  to 
encourage  rivalry  and  even  enmity  between 
groups.  As  the  result  of  systematized 
communal  industry,  orderly  social  life, 
and  stable  government,  there  is  developed 
in  the  minds  of  the  individuals  thus  as- 
sociated a  consciousness  of  tribal  or  na- 
tional unity.  They  come  to  take  pride  in 
the  power  and  possessions  of  their  tribe 
or   nation;     they    become    jealous    of    its 


118        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

prestige  and  ready  to  resent  any  real  or 
fancied  transgression  of  its  rights  by  other 
peoples.  Social  organization  makes  pos- 
sible also  concerted  action  in  defense  of 
group  interest.  A  little  experience  in 
fighting  is  suflBcient  to  show  the  advantages 
of  capable  leadership  and  strict  discipline 
in  warfare.  Hence  the  art  of  war  is  also 
systematized:  leaders  are  chosen  and 
obeyed,  armies  are  drilled  and  equipped. 
When,  in  addition  to  glorying  in  the  mili- 
tary exploits  of  its  armies,  a  people  is  at- 
tracted by  the  idea  of  adding  to  its  own 
possessions  through  the  easy  method  of 
plundering  those  of  neighboring  peoples, 
it  is  well  on  the  way  to  a  career  of  military 
conquest.  Then  follow  all  the  horrors  of 
war  that  we  know  only  too  well,  ills  wreaked 
by  men  upon  their  brother  men:  bloody 
wounds  and  death  agony,  brutal  lust  and 
savage  cruelty,  helpless  misery  and  smok- 
ing ruins.  Following  the  train  of  con- 
tinued warfare  come  other  social  ills,  less 
acute  but  more  lasting,  such  as  captive 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  119 

slavery,  the  abduction  and  subjection  of 
women,  and  military  despotism. 

In  this  emergency,  also,  it  is  rehgious 
faith  which  gives  man  the  courage  to  con- 
tinue, the  hardihood  to  endure.  His  prim- 
itive religion  develops  to  meet  the  needs 
of  his  enlarged  life.  His  gods  are  no  longer 
nature  spirits,  able,  when  he  invokes  their 
power,  so  to  control  the  object  or  process 
over  which  they  preside  as  to  furnish  him 
with  the  satisfaction  which  he  desires. 
They  have  acquired  permanent  character, 
distinct  individuality,  because  to  them 
are  attributed  characteristic  purposes,  in- 
dividual aims,  which  they  strive  contin- 
uously to  realize.  From  this  continuity 
of  divine  purpose  comes  a  uniformity  of 
divine  action,  which  may  be  depended 
upon  in  the  future  as  well  as  remembered 
of  the  past.  As  the  result  of  assigning  per- 
manence of  purpose  to  the  gods  and  thus 
imparting  more  definiteness  and  power  to 
their  personality,  they  are  gradually  loosed 
from  their  close  connection  with  particular 


120        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

objects  and  processes  in  nature.  In  con- 
sequence of  this  separation  they  grow 
fewer  in  number  and  continue  to  preside 
only  over  the  different  departments  of 
nature,  such  as  the  sea  or  the  earth  or  the 
heavens,  and  the  major  activities  of  human 
hfe,  such  as  love  or  learning  or  warfare. 
The  important  thing  to  notice  just  at  this 
point  is  that  the  gods  are  believed  to  have 
abiding  interests  of  their  own  and  to  be 
constant  in  their  devotion  to  these  interests. 
What  these  divine  purposes  are  conceived 
to  be  may  and  does  vary  greatly:  in  some 
mythologies  they  are  represented  as  self- 
aggrandizing  ambitions  or  corrupt  intrigues, 
in  others  they  are  in  a  certain  sense  benev- 
olent, as  when  the  tribal  or  national  deity 
is  supposed  to  glory  in  the  military  con- 
quests of  his  people.  But  at  any  rate  the 
gods  have  estabHshed  purposes:  in  these 
purposes  they  are  permanently  interested, 
of  them  they  are  exceedingly  jealous.  And 
just  as  two  men  having  two  very  definite 
and  very  different  ambitions  may  see  the 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  121 

advantage  of  co-operation,  and  may  make  ' 
a  compact  whereby  each  serves  the  in- 
terest of  the  other,  so  man  and  God  may 
covenant  with  one  another,  each  agreeing 
in  a  specified  way  to  serve  the  other's  in- 
terests. Thus  if  man  will  but  keep  the  law 
of  God  handed  down  in  the  sacred  writing, 
or  constantly  follow  the  prescribed  ritual 
of  worship  once  divinely  revealed  and 
miraculously  preserved  through  the  ages, 
God  will  shield  him  from  calamity,  protect 
him  from  disease,  insure  the  safety  of  his 
possessions,  preserve  the  hfe  of  his  children. 
And  the  gods  will  keep  their  promises. 
No  matter  how  unsatisfactory  or  even  dis- 
creditable from  an  ethical  standpoint  the 
special  ambitions  of  individual  deities  in 
this  type  of  religious  faith  may  be,  the  gods 
have  at  least  this  virtue  which  lies  at  the 
foundation  of  all  intelligently  organized 
society — they  will  be  true  to  a  compact, 
they  are  bound  by  an  agreement.  To 
power  is  therefore  added  justice — ^justice 
in  the  sense  of  giving  what  is  due,  paying 


122       FAITH  JUSTIFIED   BY   PROGRESS 

what  is  owed — which  becomes  the  leading 
attribute  of  deity  in  this  second  stage  of 
human  progress. 

Rehgion  thus  plays  a  necessary  and  im- 
portant part  in  the  natural  life  of  man. 
Shrines  mark  the  turnings  of  the  road, 
temples  crown  the  hilltops,  churches  dot 
the  countryside.  In  his  religion  man  here 
but  reaffirms  his  belief  that  there  is  an  in- 
telligible uniformity  in  the  operation  of 
natural  forces,  reaffirms  it  in  the  face  of 
hazardous  uncertainties,  unexpected  ex- 
ceptions, calamitous  interruptions.  Only, 
the  uniform  action  of  natural  agencies  he 
now  refers  back  to  the  continuity  of  divine 
purpose  operative  in  the  world.  Some- 
times the  purposes  of  the  gods  are  con- 
ceived as  identical  with  the  leading  human 
purposes,  as  when  we  have  gods  of  war,  and 
of  wisdom,  and  of  agriculture;  then  a  hu- 
man individual  may  honor  a  deity  when  he 
pursues  his  own  legitimate  life  aims,  and 
has  a  right  to  expect  divine  protection  in 
the  prosecution  of  his  enterprises.    But  usu- 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  123 

ally  the  gods  are  supposed  to  be  interested 
chiefly  in  their  own  glory;  then  it  is  a  fair 
exchange  of  services  between  God  and 
man:  man  by  prayer  and  sacrifice  glorifies 
God  and  God  so  controls  the  forces  of 
nature  as  to  avert  calamity  from  him  and 
insure  the  fulfilment  of  his  ambition. 
Religion  thus  expresses  man's  faith  in  the 
power  of  purpose  to  control  the  actual 
course  of  events — the  power  of  purpose 
which  he  is  conscious  of  having  himself 
exerted,  but  being  in  his  case  challenged 
by  an  intractable  and  incalculable  world. 
The  moral  value  of  such  faith  is  easy  to 
appreciate.  It  gives  man  courage  to  under- 
take the  pursuit  of  aims  whose  fulfilment 
can  come  only  after  years  of  toil  and  wait- 
ing, in  the  far  future,  near  the  end  of  life, 
perhaps;  for  his  purpose,  which  seems  puny 
and  insignificant  when  pitted  against  the 
resistless  onrush  of  physical  events,  is 
strengthened  and  reinforced  through  its 
alliance  with  a  more  powerful  purpose 
able  to  control  even  the  mighty  forces  of 


124        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

nature.  It  gives  him  also  courage  to  en- 
dure setback  and  failure,  even  to  rise  un- 
daunted after  overwhelming  calamity,  be- 
cause he  believes  God  is  on  his  side  and 
will  see  him  successfully  through  at  last. 
Nor  is  it  difficult  to  see  how  such  faith  in 
the  controlling  influence  of  divine  purpose 
over  nature  could  persist — at  least  for 
some  time.  For  the  very  courage  to  endure 
with  unshaken  resolution  calamity  and 
failure,  and  the  initiative  to  begin  afresh 
with  undiminished  vigor  and  undimmed 
hope  are  themselves  most  effective  influences 
in  bringing  ultimate  success.  And  when  the 
purposes  of  the  pious  man  are  completely 
and  finally  set  at  naught  by  unfavorable 
circumstances  it  is  always  possible  to  sup- 
pose that  his  piety  was  really  spurious  and 
that  the  disastrous  outcome  of  his  life  but 
exposed  his  previous  hypocrisy. 

After  a  time  it  becomes  impossible  longer 
to  believe  that  piety,  when  added  to  fore- 
sight and  industry,  will  certainly  bring 
prosperity  and  avert  accident  in  the  nat- 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  125 

ural  life  of  man;  it  is  seen  that  the  rain 
from  heaven  falls  alike  on  the  just  and 
the  unjust.  The  reward  of  the  man  who 
has  labored  faithfully  in  the  fear  of  God 
is  then  believed  to  be  postponed  to  the 
after-life;  the  fulfilment  of  his  purposes  are 
supposed  to  occur  in  another  world.  In 
this  after-life  the  individuals  who  have 
been  idle  and  malicious,  false  to  their  vows, 
and  neglectful  of  divine  worship,  receive 
also  their  just  recompense  of  frustration, 
failure,  and  suffering.  Thus  in  the  world- 
to-come  a  final  adjudication  of  human 
affairs  is  made  and  all  earthly  debts  are 
paid;  for  God  is  not  merely  Lawgiver,  he 
is  Judge  of  all  the  world.  Thus  to  re- 
sort to  belief  in  another  world  distinct 
from  the  natural  and  to  rely  upon  this 
world  for  the  fulfilment  of  purposes  under- 
taken here,  for  the  final  rewards  of  the 
earthly  existence,  may  seem  to  be  a  con- 
fession of  failure  and  bankruptcy  on  the 
part  of  the  natural  life  of  man.  So  in  a 
sense  it  is;   yet  the  after- world  as  a  place 


126        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

of  final  rewards  and  punishments  acquires 
no  reality  distinct  from,  and  independent 
of,  the  natural  world.  It  is  rather  a  shadowy 
counterpart  of  the  natural  world  with  some 
shifting  of  scene  and  changing  of  character, 
and  it  exists  as  a  kind  of  postscript  or  ap- 
pendage to  it.  Belief  in  the  value  of  natural 
goods  is  not  abandoned,  nor  is  faith  in 
the  natural  methods  of  obtaining  them 
destroyed;  only  the  powers  of  imagination 
are  enlisted  to  provide  a  longer  time  for 
the  working  of  the  methods  and  the  enjoy- 
ment of  the  results.  Thus  a  sort  of  com- 
promise is  struck:  when  the  diligent,  god- 
fearing man  succeeds  in  amassing  riches 
and  enjoying  their  possession  his  success 
is  attributed  to  his  own  efforts  and  the 
divine  favor;  but  when  the  endeavors  of 
such  a  man  are  unsuccessful  and  he  suffers 
from  his  failure,  his  pain  and  disappoint- 
ment are  looked  upon  as  temporary  trials 
for  which  he  will  be  more  than  recompensed 
by  an  added  amount  of  happiness  in  the 
world   to   come.     While   the   introduction 


THE  NATURAL  LIFE  127 

of  the  after-world  with  its  rewards  and 
penalties,  as  a  factor  which  must  be  reck- 
oned with  by  the  individual  who  plans  and 
works  to  insure  his  future  existence  and 
well-being,  does  not  mean  the  elevation 
of  man  to  a  diflferent  and  higher  plane  of 
living,  still  it  does  foreshadow  the  final 
breaking-up  and  abandonment  of  the  ideals 
and  practices  of  the  natural  life,  since  it 
indicates  a  growing  dissatisfaction  on  the 
part  of  man  with  the  limited  outlook  which 
the  course  of  natural  existence  offers  to 
his  will,  an  increasing  impatience  with  the 
uncertainties  of  its  prospects,  the  transiency 
of  its  joys. 

Notwithstanding  its  limitations,  the  nat- 
ural life  is  a  necessary  stage  in  human 
progress,  and  hence  its  aims  and  activities 
retain  an  important  place  in  human  life. 
Man  must  establish  himself  as  a  natural 
being  in  the  natural  world  before  he  can 
project  the  loftier  ideals  of  a  universal 
spiritual  life;  nay,  he  must,  as  we  shall 
see,  return  to  nature  for  a  closer  grapple 


128        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

and  more  thorough  conquest  of  its  forces 
before  he  actually  realizes  these  universal 
spiritual  ideals.  The  natural  life  makes 
therefore  a  permanent  appeal  to  the  normal 
human  being.  It  has  about  it  a  peculiar 
substantiality  which  causes  men  to  look 
back  upon  it  with  longing,  to  return  to 
it  with  relief,  after  protracted  and  soul- 
taxing  effort  spent  in  the  pursuit  of  spir- 
itual ideals,  which  by  contrast,  seem  often 
to  be  insubstantial,  elusive,  unreal.  It 
is  the  life  rooted  in  the  soil,  and  from 
the  soil  it  draws  vigor  and  hardihood. 
It  follows  the  rotation  of  the  seasons  and 
participates  in  the  periodic  revival,  growth, 
and  fruition,  which  accompany  seasonal 
change.  It  battles  often  victoriously  with 
the  crude  elemental  forces  of  nature  and 
acquires  therefrom  masterfulness  and  viril- 
ity. We  are  none  of  us  insensible  to  the 
appeal  of  the  natural  life  with  its  call  to 
hard  labor  and  its  promise  of  solid  enjoy- 
ments; back  to  the  soil  men  must  at  inter- 
vals go,   it  would  seem,  for  renewing  of 


THE  NATUBAL  LIFE  129 

strength  and  steadying  of  nerve.  If  the 
spring-morn  or  the  summer-day  awakens 
the  wanderlust  within  us,  tempting  us  to 
fare  forth  into  woods  and  field,  following 
momentary  impulse  and  doing  what  for 
the  present  pleases  us,  a  mellow  October 
day  with  its  message  of  rich  fruition  brings 
home  to  us  the  tangible  rewards  of  the 
natural  life:  we  would  have  a  share  in 
the  farmer's  work  and  the  farmer's  plea- 
sures, participating  in  the  vigorous,  hopeful, 
preparations  of  the  spring,  in  the  hard 
but  effective  toil  of  the  summer,  in  the 
joyful  activities  of  harvest  and  harvest 
home,  in  the  satisfaction  of  facing  the 
coming  winter  with  well-filled  barns,  abun- 
dant fuel,  and  comfortably  furnished  house. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE 

As  his  pursuit  of  present  pleasure  brings 
man  disappointment  and  disaster,  so  his 
endeavor  to  insure  himself  of  comfort  and 
well-being  during  the  course  of  his  natural 
lifetime  turns  out  to  be  a  failure.  A  con- 
viction of  the  essential  uncertainty  of  the 
natural  life  and  the  consequent  transiency 
of  its  joys  is  either  produced  in  him  slowly 
as  the  outcome  of  observation  and  ex- 
perience of  the  vicissitudes  of  fortune  in  his 
own  case  and  that  of  others,  or  else  bursts 
upon  him  with  overwhelming  force  as  the 
result  of  some  devastating  personal  calam- 
ity. But  the  breakdown  of  the  ideals  and 
practices  of  the  natural  life  does  not  leave 
human  volition  crushed  by  defeat  or  pros- 
trate through  failure:  it  responds  to  the 
emergency  with  characteristic  faith  and 
vigor  by  projecting  the  plan  of  a  larger 

X30 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  131 

and  more  permanent  life.  On  the  ashes  of 
its  burnt-out  hopes  of  natural  security 
and  satisfaction  it  raises  the  ideal  of  a 
life  which  shall  be  beyond  the  reach  of 
misfortune  and  decay,  a  life  of  eternal 
and  abiding  reality.  For,  incidental  to 
his  pursuit  of  natural  goods,  man  had 
learned  of  the  existence  of  ends  whose 
attainment  depended  upon  the  favor  of 
no  external  agency  whatsoever,  but  exclu- 
sively upon  the  activity  of  his  own  will. 
His  capacity  for  thought  was  his  own,  he 
could  exercise  it  in  acquiring  knowledge  in 
bad  fortune  as  well  as  good:  his  power  of 
choice  remained  with  him  while  he  had 
life  and  sanity;  his  emotions  could  be 
trained  to  find  pleasure  not  in  pursuing 
or  appropriating  material  objects  but  in 
contemplating  the  beautiful  and  harmo- 
nious in  nature  and  in  man.  Devotion  to 
such  spiritual  ends  now  promised  to  give 
widest  scope  to  human  personality,  greatest 
substantiality  to  human  life.  In  order  that 
it  might  give  itself  unreservedly  to  their 


132        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

pursuit  volition  attempted  to  shake  itself 
free  from  all  entanglements  of  body,  all 
limitations  of  natural  existence;  it  pro- 
posed to  rise  to  a  supernatural  life. 

The  supernatural  life  is  therefore  char- 
acterized primarily  by  its  devotion  to  "spir- 
itual" ends.  But  the  term  '* spiritual," 
when  thus  used,  stands  in  pressing  need 
of  definition  and  explanation.  For  no  word 
in  common  speech  is  more  vague  and  in- 
definite than  this.  Standing  in  the  thought 
of  most  persons  for  something  that  is 
misty  and  elusive,  its  significance  has  been 
cloudy  and  confused.  "Spiritual,"  as  ordi- 
narily used,  suggests  the  invisible  and 
intangible,  the  morally  elevated  and  edi- 
fying, the  divine  and  ecclesiastical — a  mix- 
ture of  ingredients,  with  a  mystic  flavor. 
Now  this  vagueness  and  incoherence  spring 
from  the  fact  that  the  meaning  given  to 
the  word  is  principally  negative:  the  spir- 
itual is  understood  as  that  which  is  dif- 
ferent from,  and  opposed  to,  the  natural  or 
material.     Hence  it  remains  as  essentially 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  133 

the  imperceptible  and  non-sensuous,  the 
invisible  and  intangible.  Given  no  posi- 
tive qualities  of  its  awn,  our  thought  tends 
almost  inevitably  to  conceive  it  as  the 
shadowy  counterpart  of  the  material,  less 
definite  in  outline,  less  substantial  in  struc- 
ture. The  spiritual  world  is  thus  imagined 
as  the  abode  of  insubstantial  apparitions; 
the  spiritual  life  becomes  the  pursuit  of  sub- 
lime but  ghostly  abstractions.  Moreover, 
anthropologists  have  found  in  primitive 
human  thought  the  belief  in  such  a  shadowy 
duplicate  of  the  material  world,  peopled 
by  ghostly  doubles  of  actual  human  beings, 
and  this  belief  they  suppose  to  have  orig- 
inated in  the  attempt  of  primitive  man  to 
explain  the  episodes  and  personages  of  his 
dreams.  Thus  the  idea  of  a  spiritual  realm 
seems  to  many  to  be  discredited  as  a  relic 
of  savage  superstition.  The  conception  of 
a  spiritual  life  and  a  spiritual  world  lose 
their  last  touch  of  reality;  they  dissolve 
away  completely  into  a  cloud  of  myth  and 
fancy. 


134        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

The  truth  is  that  the  spiritual  world 
possesses  as  much  positive  reality  as  the 
material.  The  idea  that  it  is  a  dream 
world,  an  imaginary  realm,  is  false  and 
preposterous.  The  fact  that  spiritual  goods 
become  constant  and  enduring  objects  of 
pursuit  by  the  human  will  may  seem  suf- 
ficient proof  of  the  reality  of  the  spiritual — 
and  so,  indeed,  it  is.  But  in  order  that 
the  real  nature  of  the  spiritual  world  shall 
be  understood,  its  positive  qualities  must 
be  discovered  and  its  relation  to  the  ma- 
terial world  clearly  perceived.  Now  we 
have  already  noted  the  need  from  the 
standpoint  of  voluntary  action,  of  rep- 
resenting objects  in  terms  of  the  bodily 
movements  required  to  attain  them.  This 
need  our  intelligence  meets  by  constructing 
the  world  of  matter  and  of  motion.  As  a 
further  development  of  this  same  point  of 
view,  we  have  found  it  advantageous  to 
think  of  objects  in  terms  of  the  movements 
of  other  objects  supposed  to  produce  them, 
and  in  result  the  world  is  conceived  as  a 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  135 

complex  of  interacting  forces.  The  neigh- 
boring spring  I  thus  represent  as  in  a  fixed 
location — ^at  the  foot  of  yonder  hill — and 
conceive  it  as  the  result  of  the  down- 
rush  of  subterranean  water.  But  it  is 
equally  necessary  if  our  wills  are  to  find 
expression,  to  conceive  of  objects  in  an- 
other way,  and  that  is  in  terms  of  the 
satisfactions  they  promise  and  the  further 
ends  to  which  they  lead.  In  consequence 
of  this  primary  personal  necessity  the 
spiritual  world  arises,  and  it  is  equally 
original,  equally  authoritative  with  the 
material.  The  spring  which  from  the  ma- 
terial standpoint  is  situated  in  a  definite 
place  and  is  the  effect  of  certain  causes  is, 
from  the  spiritual  standpoint,  the  means 
of  slaking  human  thirst,  of  restoring  man's 
strength  and  renewing  his  vigor  for  further 
activities.  Who  can  deny  that  the  thirst- 
quenching  quality  is  an  objective  fact, 
just  as  real  as  any  object  of  the  material 
world  .f^  The  relation  of  the  objects  con- 
stituting the  two  worlds  is  altogether  dif- 


136        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

ferent.  In  the  material  world  objects  are 
related  to  men's  physical  organisms,  which 
are  diverse  and  exclusive,  hence  their  re- 
lation is  external  and  mechanical.  In  the 
spiritual  world  they  are  related  to  the 
rational  will,  which  is  one  in  all  human 
beings;  hence  their  relation  is  essential 
and  organic.  Since  many  difiFerent  material 
objects  may  possess  the  same  quality  of 
satisfying  the  human  will,  such  a  quality 
is  recognized  as  a  universal  and,  as  such, 
is  part  of  the  spiritual  world.  Many  dif- 
ferent springs  and  wells  have  the  quality 
of  slaking  human  thirst:  this  quality  is 
therefore  a  universal;  it  has  no  place  in 
the  physical  world  but  belongs  to  the  spir- 
itual realm.  But  while  a  multitude  of 
physical  objects  have  the  one  same  valuable 
quality,  it  is  also  true  that  a  single  physical 
object  may  possess  many  valuable  qualities 
— ^its  meaning  may  include  many  uni- 
versal. Thus  the  single  deer-skin  may 
serve  as  clothing,  as  a  tent-covering,  or 
as  a  case  for  tools  and  weapons.    The  con- 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  137 

trast  between  the  two  worlds,  that  of 
matter  and  of  spirit,  comes  home  to  us 
with  full  force  when  we  consider  that  an 
object  which,  from  the  standpoint  of  the 
material  world,  is  one  of  the  most  in- 
significant, feeble,  and  temporary  features 
in  the  landscape,  like  a  shepherd's  cot  on 
the  mountainside,  may  easily  be  the  most 
real  and  significant  object  there  from  the 
spiritual  point  of  view,  because  it  has  the 
most  comprehensive  purpose  and  makes 
possible  the  widest  range  of  intelligent 
activity. 

The  modern  city  may  serve  as  an  illus- 
tration of  the  diflference  between  the  two 
worlds,  for  it  can  be  understood  from  the 
standpoint  of  matter  or  of  spirit.  Viewed 
physically,  it  is  an  aggregate  of  buildings 
and  of  living  individuals,  the  buildings  of 
wood  and  stone  and  steel,  spread  over  a 
vast  expanse,  massed  together  and  pressed 
upward  toward  the  centre,  and  the  living 
individuals  hurrying  to  and  fro,  out  and 
in,   among  them;   it  has   a  river   flowing 


138        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGBESS 

through  it  and  Knes  of  railway  converging 
upon  it;  in  the  more  congested  centres  are 
stores  and  banks  and  offices,  farther  out 
are  dweUing-houses,  churches,  and  schools, 
still  farther,  perhaps,  are  factories  and 
parks  and  cemeteries.  Spiritually,  the  city 
is  a  "kingdom  of  ends":  first,  although 
lowest  in  the  scale  of  spiritual  reality,  are 
the  industrial  and  economic  purposes  which 
it  subserves,  the  food  and  clothing  and 
shelter  which  its  activities  of  production 
and  distribution  provide  for  its  inhabitants; 
these  are  but  means  to  the  more  inclusive 
ends  of  the  family  life,  of  education,  of  po- 
litical organization;  this  second  class  of  ob- 
jects is  in  its  turn  instrumental  to  the 
still  fuller  personal  life  which  libraries  and 
churches,  museums  and  universities  make 
possible.  The  same  city,  but  how  differ- 
ently are  its  constituent  factors  related  in 
the  two  worlds !  In  the  one,  a  museum  and 
a  business  house  may  crowd  one  another  in 
the  same  block,  a  factory  may  stand  be- 
side a  park,  but  in  the  other  the  museum 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  139 

and  store,  park  and  factory,  belong  to  dif- 
ferent grades  of  reality. 

The  existence  of  the  spiritual  world  is,  to 
be  sure,  not  a  late  discovery  of  human  in- 
telligence, but  its  explicit  recognition  and 
continued  study  had  to  wait  for  the  time 
when  man  should  turn  away  in  disappoint- 
ment from  the  pursuit  of  natural  goods. 
In  giving  names  to  the  common  qualities 
which  he  found  numbers  of  physical  objects 
possessing,  primitive  man  acknowledged  the 
existence  of  another  order  than  the  physi- 
cal. For  these  names  stood  for  permanent 
satisfactions  which  classes  of  objects  could 
be  expected  to  furnish  the  human  will. 
These  universals  determine  conduct;  they 
become  ends  of  action  with  the  individual, 
and  he  seeks  by  talking  of  them  and  their 
attractive  features  to  influence  the  action 
of  others.  The  generalized  purposes  which 
are  pursued  in  the  succeeding  stage  of 
human  development  are  not  merely  satis- 
factory qualities,  they  are  groups  or  sys- 
tems  of   satisfactions.     Wealth    is   sought 


140        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

because  it  opens  the  way  to  many  further 
activities  at  the  choice  of  the  agent  (only, 
as  we  have  seen,  these  activities  are  usually 
of  a  physical  character).  Here,  again,  the 
communication  of  general  purposes  makes 
possible  mutual  influence  and  co-operation 
among  men.  But  these  purposes,  involving 
series  of  activities,  systems  of  objects,  have 
to  be  discussed  and  explained  if  they  are  to 
be  understood  by  all  members  of  the  com- 
munity. It  is  as  the  outcome  of  such  dis- 
cussion and  explanation  that  the  concep- 
tion of  a  spiritual  world  takes  its  rise.  The 
idea  then  dawns  that  men  may  by  thought 
and  discussion  classify  objects  in  terms  of 
the  satisfactions  which  they  themselves  af- 
ford and  the  further  ends  to  which  they 
lead.  The  discovery  is  made  of  another 
world  than  the  natural,  an  ideal  or  spiritual 
realm,  a  world  of  values,  dependent  for  ex- 
istence not  upon  physical  force  but  on 
rational  reflection  and  appreciation.  This 
world  is  justly  deemed  a  spiritual  world, 
because,  as  has  been  said,  its  interrelations 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  141 

and  unity  flow  directly  from  the  one  ra- 
tional will  which  actuates  all  men.  Its  de- 
termining principle  is  not  mechanical  neces- 
sity but  spiritual  freedom.  Its  compelling 
attraction,  moreover,  its  power  to  arouse 
enthusiasm  and  awaken  aspiration,  testifies 
directly  to  the  demand  of  the  one  will  surg- 
ing through  us  all,  a  demand  for  a  larger 
and  fuller  life. 

Because  of  the  importance  of  the  spir- 
itual principle  to  human  progress,  further 
consideration  must  be  given  to  the  consti- 
tution of  the  spiritual  world  and  the  devel- 
opment of  the  ideal  of  the  spiritual  life. 

Beginning  the  discussion  afresh,  there- 
fore, let  us  first  note  that  the  object  which 
we  locate  as  a  particular  thing  in  the  phys- 
ical world  becomes,  when  we  consider  it 
from  the  standpoint  of  the  purpose  it  sub- 
serves, a  universal.  As  a  universal,  it  is 
identical  with  no  particular  thing  existing 
in  a  definite  time  and  place;  it  is  identical 
with  the  quahty  or  character  common  to  a 
number  of  particulars  and  uniting  them 


142        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

into  a  class.  Thus,  house,  from  the  physi- 
cal standpoint,  is  a  particular  thing;  each 
house  has  its  special  time  and  place  of  ex- 
istence. The  house  I  live  in  has  its  particu- 
lar situation:  I  must  walk  in  a  certain 
direction  if  I  would  approach  it,  mount 
several  steps  and  turn  a  knob  if  I  would 
enter.  But  house,  in  the  light  of  the  pur- 
pose which  gives  it  its  meaning,  that  of 
affording  shelter  to  human  individuals  and 
families,  is  a  universal,  because  this  quality 
of  furnishing  shelter  belongs  equally  to  all 
the  habitations  of  men.  From  the  spiritual 
standpoint,  then,  the  real  object  turns  out 
to  be  not  the  particular  member  of  a  class 
but  the  essential  character  which  all  mem- 
bers of  the  class  possess  in  view  of  the  pur- 
pose they  all  subserve.  Indeed,  from  this 
point  of  view,  these  universal  meanings  are 
the  primary  realities;  a  particular  thing 
derives  what  reahty  it  possesses  from  par- 
ticipating in  the  essential  quality  character- 
istic of  its  kind  or  class.  My  house  is  a 
reality,  not  on  account  of  the  accidents  of 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  143 

its  size,  location,  and  material,  primarily, 
but  rather  because  of  its  essential  meaning, 
a  meaning  which  belongs  to  all  houses  be- 
cause they  realize  the  same  end  of  provid- 
ing shelter.  It  was  Plato  who  first  saw 
with  clearness  the  reality  of  these  universal 
characters,  founded  upon  the  common  pur- 
poses which  things  subserve;  he  asserted 
that  such  ideal  entities  were  the  only  things 
truly  real;  he  called  them  ideas y  and  since 
his  time  they  have  been  known  as  Platonic 
ideas. 

Now,  the  distinguishing  mark  of  these 
ideal  essences  or  characteristics  is  their 
universality,  and  their  universality  at  first 
appears  in  the  fact  that  they  are  general 
and  not  particular.  The  degree  of  their 
universality  will  consequently  be  seen  to 
depend  upon  how  general  they  are,  how 
many  objects  they  are  common  to.  It  is 
obvious,  moreover,  that  characters  diflFer 
widely  in  generality  and  hence  in  the 
universality  which  depends  upon  it.  More 
general  than  house  in  meaning  is  human 


144        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

production,  for  it  includes  tools  and  weap- 
ons and  clothing  as  well  as  shelters — every- 
thing in  fact  that  man  can  make  and 
fashion.  As  essential  characters  differ  in 
degree  of  generality  they  may  be  arranged  in 
a  series  leading  from  the  least  to  the  most 
general,  as,  for  example,  Socrates,  Athe- 
nian, Greek,  Aryan,  Man,  Living  Being, 
Being.  Since  these  universal  qualities  rep- 
resent purposes  which  groups  of  objects 
fulfil  for  the  one  rational  will  which  acts 
in  all  men,  they  are  not  by  nature  inde- 
pendent of  one  another  nor  separate  in 
their  fields  of  existence.  Differing  them- 
selves in  degree  of  generahty,  these  char- 
acters are  subsumed,  the  one  under  the 
other,  as  the  less  under  the  more  general, 
as  species  under  genus.  Thus,  "house" 
in  meaning  falls  within  "building,"  which 
includes  also  barns,  workshops,  etc.;  "build- 
ing" falls  under  the  head  of  "human  pro- 
ductions," which  embrace,  in  addition, 
tools,  clothing,  and  the  like.  Proceeding 
with   such   classification,   all    qualities    or 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  145 

characteristics  may  be  subsumed  under 
the  one  least  definite  and  most  common, 
as  the  summum  genus,  and  thus  united 
in  one  system.  Thus  plants,  animals,  and 
men  fall  under  the  concept  of  living  being, 
and  this,  along  with  that  of  inanimate  or 
non-hving  being,  under  the  concept  of 
being.  Being,  the  most  general  of  char- 
acteristics, signifies  that  quahty  which  an 
object  must  have  to  become  an  end  of 
vohtion  at  all — the  power  of  reacting  to 
the  human  will,  and  hence  conditioning  its 
expression.  Thus  our  thought,  exploring 
the  meaning  of  things,  discovers  a  system  of 
characters,  all  universal  and  all  purposive; 
this  system  is  of  course  none  other  than 
the  Platonic  hierarchy  of  Ideas. 

Let  us,  then,  acknowledge  this  truth: 
these  ideal  characters  are  fully  as  much 
facts  as  are  the  objects  or  events  of  the 
physical  world;  their  relations  are  every 
whit  as  essential  and  binding  as  the  se- 
quences of  physical  events;  together  they 
constitute  a  system  just  as  real  as  the  inter- 


146        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

acting  forces  of  the  material  world.  The 
reality  of  this  ideal  or  spiritual  system  is 
implicitly  acknowledged  in  every  act  of 
volition.  But  its  conscious  recognition  adds 
much  to  the  scope  and  significance  of  human 
life,  besides  reminding  man  of  the  dignity 
of  his  own  freedom.  For  man  to  understand 
that  the  object  which  he  realizes  is  in  its 
essential  character  universal  enlarges  his 
conscious  horizons;  he  recognizes  that  his 
experience  is  not  private,  particular,  ex- 
clusive; he  sees  instead  that  in  attaining 
his  own  end  he  is  participating  in  universal 
human  achievement.  Understanding  fur- 
ther that  the  end  which  he  seeks  has  a 
permanent  place  in  an  abiding  system  of 
meanings,  he  is  able  in  its  attainment  to 
rise  free  from  the  changing  flux  of  physical 
events  and  identify  himself  with  universal 
and  eternal  reality.  Reflection  brings 
home  to  him  the  universality  of  all  human 
intelligence,  the  fundamental  unity  of  all 
human  voHtion,  and  on  this  foundation 
he  may  build  his  own  personal  character 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  147 

undisturbed  by  the  change  and  decay  of 
the  physical  world.  Moreover,  this  first 
insight  into  the  structure  of  the  spiritual 
world  increases  man's  knowledge  of  the 
possibilities  of  attainment  which  exist  for 
his  will.  The  system  of  meanings  just  de- 
scribed is  in  truth  a  world  of  freedom,  for 
its  constituent  factors  have  their  char- 
acter and  position  determined  not  by  any 
external  agency  but  by  their  relation  to 
the  human  will  itself.  As  first  formulated 
by  Plato  the  hierarchy  of  ideas  was  ret- 
rospective rather  than  prospective  in  its 
reference,  it  is  true — conceiving  of  objects 
not  so  much  in  terms  of  the  further  pur- 
poses which  they  might  subserve  as  in 
terms  of  the  qualities  which  they,  at  least 
by  implication,  already  possessed  and  were 
able  to  offer.  Thus  my  house  is  not  con- 
ceived in  terms  of  the  many  further  pur- 
poses which  it  may  fulfil  but  in  accordance 
with  the  qualities  already  inherent  in  its 
essential  character  as  a  house — that  it  is 
a  building,  a  physical  object,  etc.    But  if. 


148        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

understanding  this,  we  appreciate  all  that* 
is  impHed  in  the  meaning  of  things,  we 
shall  enormously  enlarge  our  possibilities 
of  satisfaction,  shall  greatly  enrich  the 
resources  of  our  world. 

We  acknowledge  the  existence  of  uni- 
versal characters,  due  to  the  fact  that  the 
groups  or  classes  of  objects  furnish  to  the 
will  the  same  satisfaction.  House  is  such 
a  general  character,  since  the  purpose  of 
giving  shelter  is  common  to  all  houses. 
But  in  addition  to  the  features  that  are 
common  to  all  cases,  these  general  char- 
acters have  a  further  meaning  which  dif- 
fers in  different  instances  of  their  appear- 
ance. This  is  due  to  the  fact  that  the 
further  ends  or  activities  to  which  these 
ideal  characters  lead  are  different  in  dif- 
ferent cases.  All  houses  share  in  the  com- 
mon purpose  of  furnishing  shelter,  but 
some  are  means  to  many  further  ends; 
all  furnish  the  one  fundamental  satisfac- 
tion, but  some  make  possible  many  more 
extended  activities:  all  houses  give  shelter; 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  149 

some  are,  in  addition,  centres  of  family 
life  and  domestic  devotion;  a  few  of  these 
latter  are  also  sources  of  far-reaching  so- 
cial benefit.  Now,  the  point  to  be  no- 
ticed just  here  is  that  the  meaning  of  the 
ideal  characters  we  are  discussing  includes, 
in  the  case  of  each  one,  all  the  further  ends 
to  which  it  may  lead.  Hence  its  universal- 
ity consists  not  merely  in  its  generality, 
in  the  number  of  instances  of  its  same 
identical  quality  which  it  sums  up,  but 
also  in  the  variety  of  different  features 
which  it  includes.  Its  full  meaning,  its 
total  character  is  therefore  seldom,  if  ever, 
exemplified  by  every  one  of  its  instances; 
indeed,  it  would  seem  that  the  more  fully 
the  meaning  of  a  character  is  developed, 
the  fewer  are  the  instances  of  it  which  we 
should  hkely  find.  Searching,  therefore,  for 
the  true  meaning  of  universal  spiritual  ob- 
jects, we  are  forced  to  choose  between 
instances,  seeking  for  those  in  which  the 
possibilities  of  the  character  in  question 
have  been  most  fully  explored.    We  should 


150        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

not  expect  to  find  the  full  meaning  of 
house  in  the  quahties  common  to  all  houses 
from  the  Indian  wigwam  to  the  royal 
palace;  we  should  seek  for  it  in  those 
cases  where  houses  were  made  to  furnish 
the  greatest  variety  of  human  satisfac- 
tions. 

To  recognize  that  objects  whose  general 
character  is  well  known  are  capable  of 
yielding  different  degrees  of  satisfaction, 
according  as  one  has  the  intelligence  to 
grasp  their  possibilities  and  the  enterprise 
to  follow  them  up,  is  still  further  to  enlarge 
the  opportunities  for  voluntary  achieve- 
ment. The  scope  of  activity  which  the  real 
world  permits  to  human  volition  is  seen  to 
depend  not  entirely  upon  the  number  of 
objects  it  attains — this,  as  we  have  seen,  is 
determined  largely  by  fortune  and  circum- 
stance— but  partly,  at  least,  upon  the  use 
which  it  is  able  to  make  of  the  objects  it 
does  possess.  A  man  with  the  wit  to  un- 
derstand the  uses  to  which  a  house  may  be 
put,  and  the  ability  to  avail  himself  of  the 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  151 

means  which  it  places  at  his  disposal,  may 
obtain  a  more  extensive  satisfaction  from  a 
cottage  than  many  another  does  from  a 
mansion.  This  fact  was  reHed  upon  by  the 
Cynics  and  Stoics,  ethical  schools  of  an- 
tiquity, to  support  their  cardinal  doctrine 
that  man  finds  happiness  and  spiritual  free- 
dom only  when  he  ceases  to  depend  upon 
material  possessions  and  seeks  those  spir- 
itual ends  whose  attainment  depends  only 
upon  his  own  reason  and  will.  The  wise 
man,  they  held,  can  turn  any  event  or 
circumstance  into  a  means  of  personal 
development  by  understanding  its  universal 
character  and  availing  himself  of  its  pos- 
sibilities for  spiritual  expansion.  Even  the 
direst  calamity,  his  reason  will  show  him  to 
be  the  necessary  outcome  of  universal  law, 
and  capable  when  properly  met  of  strength- 
ening his  courage  and  increasing  his  power 
of  endurance.  If  a  storm  lay  waste  his 
fields  and  destroy  his  crops,  his  reason  will 
understand  it  as  a  result  of  those  regular 
processes  of  atmospheric  change  which  are 


152        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

responsible  for  the  invigorating  breeze  and 
beneficent  rain;  thus  he  may  accept  the 
event  calmly,  even  gratefully,  regarding  the 
necessity  for  repair  and  rehabilitation  which 
it  creates  as  an  opportunity  for  the  exercise 
of  his  courage  and  enterprise.  Reason  not 
merely  discovers  the  permanent  possibili- 
ties of  satisfaction  already  existing  in  the 
world,  it  also  reveals  the  opportunities  for 
further  achievement  offered  by  every  event 
that  occurs. 

We  have  not  exhausted  the  meaning  of 
the  spiritual  world,  however,  when  we  see 
that  its  ideal  constituents,  besides  being  re- 
peated in  many  different  instances,  may 
themselves  be  means  to  many  diflferent 
ends.  In  this  way  we  do  enlarge  our  con- 
ception of  their  universality,  understand- 
ing it  not  merely  as  generality  but  as  com- 
prehensiveness. But  this  new  insight  has 
important  consequences  which,  when  made 
clear,  will  bring  us  in  sight  of  our  goal — 
and  show  us  the  spiritual  world  as  a  grow- 
ing reality.     These  ideal  objects  differ  in 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  153 

the  degree  of  their  comprehensiveness,  in 
the  range  of  further  activities  to  which 
they  are  instrumental.  Varying  as  they 
do,  certain  ones  which  are  less  comprehen- 
sive are  included  within  the  meaning  of 
others  which  are  more  so,  not  generically, 
as  the  particular  falls  within  the  more 
general,  but  organically,  as  the  part  is  in- 
cluded within  the  whole  of  which  it  is  a 
member,  and  to  whose  existence  it  is  in- 
strumental. Thus  gymnasium,  in  its  ideal 
character  or  meaning,  not  merely  falls  as  a 
particular  under  the  more  general  concept 
of  building,  it  is  also  included  as  a  factor  in 
the  more  comprehensive  character  or  signif- 
icance of  college  or  university  to  whose  life 
it  is  instrumental.  Relating  these  spiritual 
objects  in  the  order  of  their  comprehensive- 
ness, we  shall  see  them  in  the  fulness  of 
their  reality  as  an  expanding  system.  Thus 
individual  security,  family  life,  the  posses- 
sion of  property,  the  establishment  of  repu- 
tation, are  all  of  them  involved  in  tribal  or 
conmiunity  well-being;  the  well-being  of  the 


154        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

community  thus  maintained,  of  many  com- 
munities, in  fact,  is  included  within  the 
more  comprehensive  meaning  of  national 
welfare,  reahzed  through  care  for  public 
health  and  education,  the  administration  of 
just  and  eflFective  government,  convenient 
facilities  for  communication  and  transpor- 
tation, efficient  methods  of  producing  wealth 
and  fair  methods  of  distributing  it;  na- 
tional welfare,  and  international  as  well,  are 
themselves  included  within  the  still  more 
comprehensive  end  of  universal  human  well- 
being  depending  upon  mutual  understand- 
ing, mutual  co-operation,  and  mutual  sym- 
pathy among  all  men,  ends  which  are  just 
beginning  to  be  realized,  and  thus  converted 
into  spiritual  realities.  This  spiritual  sys- 
tem represents  the  progressive  expansion  of 
the  sphere  of  free  human  activity,  hence  the 
progressive  realization  of  the  human  will;  it 
is  a  system  whose  character  and  constitu- 
tion are  determined  by  no  other  agency 
than  rational  volition  itself. 

Appreciating  how  the  objects  of  the  spir- 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  155 

itual  world  are  related  in  an  order  of  in- 
creasing comprehensiveness,  we  are  led  in- 
evitably to  the  thought  of  an  all-compre- 
hensive object,  an  object  which  includes  in 
its  meaning  all  possible  quaUties,  an  object 
which,  in  its  attainment,  subserves  every 
purpose  and  realizes  every  end.  Now  this 
conception,  while  it  is  merely  an  ideal  and 
does  not  really  constitute  the  spiritual 
world  a  completed  whole,  has  nevertheless 
an  important  regulative  oflBce  in  pointing 
out  the  direction  of  its  development  and  in- 
dicating the  goal  of  its  progress.  The  con- 
ception of  an  object  so  comprehensive  as  to 
include  in  its  meaning  all  possible  satisfac- 
tions is  simply  an  expression  of  the  demand 
of  volition  itself  for  an  all-comprehensive 
life;  it  is  this  demand  projected  in  the  form 
of  an  ideal,  an  end  to  be  realized;  once 
attained,  it  would  insure  to  the  will  a  life  of 
uninterrupted  activity,  of  perfect  satisfac- 
tion. The  life  promised  through  the  real- 
ization of  the  Absolute  Ideal  presents  it- 
self in  diflFerent  forms:  as  thought,  which 


156        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

through  the  classification  and  correlation  of 
all  ideas,  attains  Truth;  as  feeling,  which 
through  an  appreciation  of  the  harmonies 
among  perceived  objects,  attains  Beauty;  as 
conduct,  which  through  a  proportionate 
reahzation  of  all  human  capacities,  attains 
Goodness.  Since,  further,  the  Absolute 
Ideal  is  conceived  as  furnishing  complete 
satisfaction  to  rational  volition  as  such,  it 
must  provide  through  its  activities  for  the 
satisfaction  of  volition  in  all  its  individual 
embodiments.  This  means  that  it  must 
provide  for  the  satisfaction  of  all  human 
individuals  in  so  far  as  the  power  of  rational 
volition  has  gained  expression  through  them. 
Hence  the  Absolute  Ideal  may  be  conceived 
as  a  perfected  society  of  free  persons,  an  in- 
telligent community  united  in  complete  mu- 
tual understanding,  co-operation,  and  sym- 
pathy. Such  a  life,  indeed,  does  volition 
aspire  to;  it  stands,  therefore,  as  the  su- 
preme ideal  of  human  conduct. 

While    the    conception    of    an    all-com- 
prehensive object  has  an  important  bear- 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  157 

ing  upon  the  structure  of  the  spiritual 
world,  we  must  not  forget  that  it  is,  never- 
theless, an  idea  and  not  a  reality.  For 
there  is  a  distinction  between  a  spiritual 
ideal  and  spiritual  reality.  This  distinc- 
tion is  one  easy  to  overlook  because  spir- 
itual objects  are  all  of  them  ideal  in  the 
sense  that  they  are  universal  and  are  re- 
lated not  mechanically  but  teleologically. 
Impressed  with  what  we  may  thus  con- 
sider to  be  the  ideality  of  the  spiritual 
world  as  a  whole,  we  are  naturally  inclined 
to  slur  over  any  distinction  between  idea 
and  fact  within  its  boundaries.  Yet  this 
distinction  holds,  and  cuts  very  deep. 
Real  spiritual  objects  are  objects  which 
have  been  realized  through  voluntary  ac- 
tion, whose  possibilities  of  satisfaction  have 
been  proved  through  the  experience  of 
actual  attainment.  Of  this  character  are 
many  established  social  goods,  such  as 
family  Ufe,  popular  education,  democratic 
government,  etc.  These  ends  have  been 
in  large  part  realized  and  their  meaning 


158        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

for  volition  actually  verified;  one  may 
seek  them  with  reasonable  certainty  of  ob- 
taining their  promised  satisfaction.  Even 
the  more  comprehensive  ends  of  truth  and 
beauty  have  been  so  far  attained  as  to 
make  their  value  a  fact  for  human  intel- 
ligence: science  and  art  each  opens  the  way 
to  a  wide  range  of  free  activities.  But 
the  ideal  of  a  perfected  society  of  free 
beings,  of  the  completed  development  of 
human  personality,  of  universal  human 
brotherhood,  has  not  thus  been  realized — 
at  least  not  suflSciently  to  warrant  us  in 
considering  it  a  reality.  It  is  an  ideal, 
the  supreme,  the  governing,  ideal  of  hu- 
man conduct,  but  as  yet  idea  and  not 
reality. 

A  serious  error  it  is,  therefore,  to  regard 
the  Absolute  Good  as  a  real  object  in  the 
spiritual  world.  Yet  just  this  error  was 
committed  by  those  wise  and  earnest  souls 
of  antiquity  who  first  clearly  recognized 
the  existence  and  structure  of  the  spiritual 
world  and  sought  to  identify  themselves 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  159 

with  its  reality.  The  idea  of  an  object 
comprehensive  enough  to  satisfy  every 
inteUigent  purpose  they  took  to  be  the 
ultimate  reality.  Or,  otherwise  expressed, 
reality  they  believed  to  be  a  teleological 
system,  every  part  of  which  was  the  ex- 
pression and  fulfilment  of  intelligent  will. 
So  thought  the  Stoics  who,  of  all  the  an- 
cient schools  of  moral  philosophy,  attained 
to  the  clearest  and  most  adequate  concep- 
tion of  the  spiritual  world  and  the  spir- 
itual life.  They  believed  that  the  existing 
universe  or  "nature"  was  really  a  perfect 
spiritual  system,  every  part  of  which  was 
determined  by  rational  purpose.  For  man 
himself  to  realize  the  universal  spiritual  ideal 
no  effort  on  his  part  was  required  to  trans- 
form  the  actual  conditions  of  his  life — every 
event  that  actually  occurred  in  the  world 
was  already  a  necessary  means  to  the 
fulfilment  of  the  Universal  Purpose.  He 
had  only  to  understand  the  circumstances 
of  his  own  life,  whatever  they  might  be, 
in  their  true  reality  and  he  would  find 


160        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

them  to  be  expressions  of  the  One  Ra- 
tional Will  pervading  the  universe  and 
manifested  in  his  own  personality,  would 
see  them,  in  fact,  as  the  realization  of  his 
own  freedom.  In  the  sphere  of  action, 
consequently,  the  Stoic  doctrine  required 
of  the  human  individual  not  effort  but 
acquiescence.  This  meant,  however,  that 
the  whole  burden  of  moral  attainment  was 
thrown  upon  human  thought:  it  was  man's 
reason  which  was  relied  upon  to  raise  him 
to  eternal  spiritual  reality.  And  it  was  no 
light  task  which  was  thus  assigned  to 
human  intellect — to  understand  how  every 
object  that  existed,  every  event  that  oc- 
curred, no  matter  to  what  extent  it  frus- 
trated man's  plans  and  thwarted  his  pur- 
poses, no  matter  how  much  sufifering  it 
caused  him,  was,  nevertheless,  a  means  to 
the  fulfilment  of  the  Universal  Purpose 
which  was  his  purpose.  Of  course,  it  is 
impossible  thus  to  conceive  of  all  human 
experiences  if  we  take  them  at  their  face 
value,  as  they  actually  present  themselves. 


THE  SUPERNATURAX  LIFE  161 

Hence  the  logic  of  their  position  compels 
those  who,  like  the  Stoics,  believe  that  all 
reality  is  comprehended  within  one  spir- 
itual system  to  regard  much  of  what  occurs 
in  the  world  of  human  experience  as  not 
real  but  apparent — to  regard  evil  in  its 
different  forms  as  illusory.  Hence  there 
results  an  increasing  tendency  to  disregard 
and  depreciate  the  world  of  sense-experi- 
ence and  observed  fact  with  its  contradic- 
tions and  maladjustments,  in  favor  of  an 
ideal  sphere  where  everything  is  imagined 
to  work  in  harmony  with  the  realization 
of  one  supreme  end.  The  spiritual  world 
tends  to  become  more  and  more  an  object 
of  mystic  vision,  a  Heavenly  City,  far  re- 
moved in  its  perfection  from  the  earthly 
scene.  As  such,  the  spiritual  world  be- 
comes more  and  more  completely  divorced 
from  the  natural.  The  latter,  from  being 
merely  apparent,  becomes  positively  evil, 
its  evil  inhering,  however,  in  its  negativity. 
In  this  way,  with  the  Stoics  and  Plato- 
nists,  spiritual  objects  became  supernatural 


162        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

objects  and  the  life  devoted  to  their  pur- 
suit a  supernatural  life. 

In  the  course  of  human  history  a  new 
type  of  life  thus  arises  which  may  ap- 
propriately be  called  supernatural.  Super- 
natural, because  those  who  professed  it 
explicitly  abandoned  all  natural  "goods," 
wealth,  fame,  and  bodily  comfort,  and 
devoted  themselves  entirely  to  the  attain- 
ment of  spiritual  reality.  Natural  exis- 
tence was  esteemed  only  as  furnishing  the 
occasion  and  opportunity  for  rising  to  a 
supernatural  life.  In  this  higher  life  man 
identifies  his  will  with  ends  which  possess 
not  future  existence  only,  but  eternal 
reahty.  Human  volition  seeks  not  merely 
to  encompass  the  whole  course  of  man's 
natural  existence;  it  aspires  to  embrace 
the  spiritual  ideal  in  its  unity  and  com- 
pleteness. Once  more,  then,  does  the  will 
of  man  seek  a  remedy  for  the  disappoint- 
ment and  failure  resulting  from  over- 
confidence,  in  the  exercise  of  still  greater 
faith;    it  prepares  the  way  for  a  final  vie- 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  163 

tory  over  the  ills  of  nature  by  transcend- 
ing the  sphere  of  natural  existence  alto- 
gether and  converting  it  into  a  means  for 
the  reaUzation  of  a  more  permanent  and 
complete  life. 

Even  if  one  fail  to  see  why  faith  is  needed 
to  enable  one  to  pursue  the  object  of  his 
momentary  desire  or  to  provide  for  his 
future  security  and  comfort,  no  one  will 
deny  that  faith  is  exercised  by  the  man 
who  sacrifices  all  natural  goods  in  order  to 
seek  a  spiritual  ideal.  If  on  the  contrary, 
we  do  admit  that  it  takes  real  initiative 
to  enable  a  man  to  resist  the  attraction  of 
surrounding  objects,  while  he  seeks  to  ob- 
tain an  object  which  at  the  time  is  only 
an  idea,  and  that  it  requires  true  courage 
to  forego  the  assurance  of  present  pleasure 
in  order  to  pursue  an  end  which  lies  in  the 
uncertain  future,  how  much  more  must  we 
acknowledge  that  genuine  heroism  is  dis- 
played by  one  who  renounces  the  whole 
natural  world  with  its  pressing  actuality  and 
prospect  of  substantial  benefits  for  ends  be- 


164        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

longing  to  the  world  which  his  own  spiritual 
vision  has  created!  In  the  first  stage  of 
human  progress  man  sacrifices  the  object  of 
present  perception  to  the  end  which  his 
thought  represents,  in  the  second  stage  he 
sacrifices  all  the  satisfactions  which  the 
present  situation  offers  in  order  to  pursue 
an  end  which  his  imagination  projects  into 
the  future.  But  this  future,  while  imaginary 
and  uncertain,  is  nevertheless  represented 
as  continuous  with  the  present,  part  of  the 
same  order,  to  be  enacted  in  the  same  space, 
and  joined  to  the  present  by  the  chain  of 
natural  causation.  The  third  step  which 
we  are  now  considering,  compels  man  to 
turn  his  back  on  the  familiar  world  in  which 
he  has  made  himself  at  home,  the  world 
founded  on  the  primary  necessities  of  action 
and  the  use  of  his  own  physical  organism. 
This  world,  whose  actuality  has  become 
estabhshed  and  imperious,  is  to  be  re- 
nounced for  another  world,  which  is  not  as 
yet  fully  constituted  and  whose  completion 
depends  in  part  on  the  eflForts  of  his  own 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  165 

will.  The  structure  of  the  spiritual  world 
is  not  forced  upon  his  notice  by  conditions 
of  his  own  acting;  it  is  discovered  by  him 
after  he  has  reflected  upon  the  possibilities 
of  satisfaction  held  forth  by  different  ob- 
jects. Nor  can  he  depend  upon  his  own 
experience  of  attainment  to  teach  him  of 
the  value  of  objects;  that  will  be  far  too 
limited.  He  must  be  able  to  discuss  this 
subject  with  his  fellows,  considering  the 
different  purposes  which  objects  subserve, 
and  their  varying  degrees  of  comprehensive- 
ness. Out  of  such  discussion  and  the  fur- 
ther reflection  to  which  it  leads,  the  realm 
of  ends,  the  world  of  freedom,  takes  its  rise. 
It  is  thus  the  creation  of  general  intelligence: 
its  objects,  although  they  may  be  real,  re- 
quire for  their  discovery  the  exercise  of 
conceptual  thought.  And  when  we  con- 
sider that  the  human  will  at  this  stage  is 
not  content  with  devoting  itself  to  those 
ideals  which  in  some  cases  have  been 
achieved  and  have  had  their  value  realized, 
but  commits  itself  to  the  reahzation  of  that 


166        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

end  which  is  not  merely  spiritual,  but  a 
spiritual  ideal,  that  of  the  Absolute  Good, 
the  AU-eomprehensive  End,  which  when  at- 
tained will  yield  every  possible  satisfaction, 
we  see  that  it  has  required  of  itself  a  su- 
preme courage,  a  sublime  faith. 

The  faith  upon  which  the  supernatural 
life  rests  may  be  expressed  in  the  form  of  a 
postulate.  Human  thought  in  this  case 
postulates  the  existence  of  a  complete  system 
of  ends  in  whose  permanent  reality  man  can^ 
through  the  exercise  of  his  reason,  participate. 
The  principle  in  question  is,  of  course,  that 
of  teleology,  since  the  relation  which  binds 
objects  together  in  this  spiritual  system  is 
that  of  means  to  end.  The  teleological 
principle  is  one  that  emphasizes  the  essen- 
tial unity  of  humanity;  for  the  ends  with 
which  it  is  concerned  are,  as  universals, 
common  to  all  individuals  and  witness  the 
underlying  unity  of  will  among  them.  Be- 
cause, moreover,  these  ends  are  included  in 
a  single  comprehensive  system,  the  indi- 
viduals who  reahze  them  are  joined  in  a 


THE  SUPERNATUBAL  LIFE  167 

community  of  purpose.  This  spiritual  sys- 
tem does  not  need  the  efforts  of  man  to 
realize  it,  however;  it  already  exists  as  a 
finished  reahty.  Man  has  only  to  exercise 
his  reason  in  order  to  understand  this — ^to 
see  things  as  they  are,  all  comprehended 
within  the  system  of  universal  spiritual  real- 
ity. And  since  this  spiritual  system  is  the 
completed  fulfilment  of  the  Universal  Will 
which  manifests  itself  in  each  human  indi- 
vidual, intellectual  insight  into  the  spiritual 
organization  of  the  universe  imparts  per- 
manent reality  to  the  man  who  attains  it, 
for  it  shows  him  all  the  possibilities  of  his 
own  will  completely  reahzed. 

The  activity  through  which  man  ex- 
pected to  attain  to  supernatural  reality 
was  intellectual — the  activity  of  conceptual 
thought.  The  supernatural  life  was  re- 
garded as  an  achievement  of  the  reason 
common  to  all,  exercised  in  free  discussion, 
but  rising  to  the  full  height  of  its  powers  in 
philosophical  meditation.  It  is  conceptual 
thought  that  distinguishes  man  from  the 


168        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

animals  and  enables  him  to  discover  uni- 
versal characters  whose  permanent  reality- 
underlies  the  changing  particulars  of  sense. 
It  is  conceptual  thought  which  reveals  to 
the  human  individual  all  the  possibilities  of 
satisfaction  in  a  given  situation  and,  at  the 
same  time,  by  showing  to  him  his  true  nature 
as  a  man,  enables  him  to  take  the  course 
which  promises  most  to  enlarge  the  life  of 
humanity.  It  is  conceptual  thought  which 
discloses  to  man's  vision  the  Absolute  Spir- 
itual Reality  and  enables  him  to  welcome 
every  event  that  occurs  in  his  life  as  an  ex- 
pression of  the  Universal  Purpose  and, 
hence,  the  fuljSlment  of  his  own  will.  To 
make  thought  thus  play  the  part  of  action 
in  the  attainment  of  an  end  may  seem  like 
a  contradiction  in  terms,  since  we  have 
understood  by  action  adjustment  to  actual 
conditions,  and  thought  deals  only  with  the 
ideal.  Still,  actuality  appears  as  the  limit- 
ing or  conditioning  factor  even  in  thought 
— if  not  as  presented,  at  least  as  repre- 
sented.    Actuality  appears  in  thought  in 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  169 

the  form  of  ideas  that  have  been  verified 
and  hence  stand  as  facts.  These  ideas  thus 
acquire  the  independence  of  actuahty,  the 
standing  of  estabUshed  facts.  To  them  our 
theories  must  adjust  themselves,  with  them 
our  speculative  constructions  must  deal; 
and  they  may  show  a  stubbornness  and  in- 
adaptability which  is  equal  to  that  of  actual 
existence.  Thus,  as  noted  above,  the  con- 
structive thought  which  endeavors  to  com- 
prehend all  reality  within  one  teleological 
system  finds  an  almost  insuperable  obstacle 
in  the  facts  of  sin  and  evil. 

The  end  at  which  this  intellectual  activ- 
ity aims  is  a  life  which  attains  supernatural 
reality  because  identified  in  thought  and 
disposition  with  the  universal  spiritual  sys- 
tem. Ideally,  this  means  membership  in  a 
community  of  intelhgence  which  is  eternal, 
because  founded  upon  teleological  relation- 
ships which  persist  in  spite  of  the  transiency 
of  particular  things  that  manifest  and 
exemplify  them.  While  natural  objects 
change  and  decay,  the  purposes  they  sub- 


170        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

serve  are  permanent  and  enduring,  because 
they  are  all  comprehended  within  the  one 
absolute  purpose,  which  is  the  supreme 
reality.  The  supernatural  life  means,  then, 
in  the  hopes  of  those  who  seek  to  achieve  it, 
citizenship  in  a  Heavenly  City  which  abides 
in  the  face  of  all  earthly  dissolution  and  de- 
cay, a  city  which  includes  all  humanity,  or 
at  least  all  men  who  rise  to  the  possibilities 
of  their  rational  selfhood.  In  actual  prac- 
tice the  supernatural  life  has  meant  a  life 
withdrawn  from  active  pursuits,  commer- 
cial and  political,  and  devoted  to  rational 
reflection.  Thus  the  ancient  Stoics  found 
the  highest  human  good  in  the  "life  ac- 
cording to  reason."  Through  reason  alone, 
they  believed,  could  man  be  freed  from  the 
evils  and  limitations  of  the  natural  life, 
since  rational  insight  depended  upon  no 
gift  of  fortune  and  was  always  within  the 
power  of  man  as  man.  They,  therefore, 
proposed  to  uproot  from  their  natures  those 
desires  which  required  for  their  gratifica- 
tion the  possession  of  material  objects  in 
order  to  pursue,   undisturbed   by   earthly 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  171 

events  and  emotional  clamor,  that  intellec- 
tual activity  which  revealed  to  them  the 
eternal  realities.  The  supernatural  life  be- 
came in  practice  the  life  of  the  wise  man 
secluded  from  the  world  and  absorbed  in 
his  own  thought.  The  Neo-Platonists,  who 
followed  the  Stoics,  went  even  further 
in  their  "  other- worldliness,"  discarding 
thought  as  a  source  of  insight  into  the  na- 
ture of  reality,  because  even  its  most  gen- 
eral principles  retained  an  element  of  defi- 
niteness  and  limitation,  while  Absolute 
Reality  they  held  to  be  beyond  limit  or 
definition.  Hence  this  later  school  placed 
above  reason  feeling^  a  state  of  emotional 
ecstasy  which,  they  thought,  must  super- 
vene, after  reason  had  accomplished  its 
uttermost,  in  order  to  reveal  to  man  the 
Infinite  Spiritual  Reality.  In  the  final  step, 
the  supernatural  life  is  carried  beyond  the 
sphere  of  rational  discussion,  of  intelligent 
communication,  and  made  in  its  essence  a 
mystical,  an  intuitional,  an  ineffable  experi- 
ence. 

The  intellectualism  and  other-worldliness 


172        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

of  the  Stoic  doctrine,  however,  did  not 
prevent  its  resulting  in  notable  practical 
achievement.  For  the  Stoic  "life  accord- 
ing to  reason"  was  understood  as  a  "life 
according  to  nature,"  that  is,  a  life  accord- 
ing to  the  rational  purpose  controlling  the 
world.  But  harmony  with  the  Universal 
Purpose  meant  for  the  individual  discharge 
of  his  vocation  in  the  world;  also  it  meant 
recognition  of  the  equal  rights  of  all  human 
beings  as  alike  expressions  of  the  cosmic 
reason.  Hence  we  find  the  Stoics  labor- 
ing effectively  for  such  poUtical  and  social 
reforms  as  the  extension  of  the  rights  of 
Roman  citizenship  to  foreign  peoples  and 
the  amelioration  of  the  condition  of  slaves 
and  serfs.  In  fact,  the  ancient  Roman 
society  presents  no  figure  so  noble,  so  sub- 
lime, as  the  Stoic,  strengthened  and  poised 
by  his  spiritual  vision,  maintaining  his  phil- 
osophic calm,  undisturbed  by  the  allure- 
ments of  vice,  unaffrighted  by  the  threats 
of  tyrants,  unshaken  by  suffering,  torture, 
and  death — a  living  demonstration  of  the 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  173 

essential  dignity  of  man  as  a  rational  be- 
ing. 

But  this  bold  attempt  of  human  volition 
once  and  for  all  to  transcend  the  limitations 
of  natural  existence  and  to  shake  itself  free 
from  entanglement  with  changing,  decaying 
matter  did  not  succeed.  Despising  all  nat- 
ural goods,  these  brave  souls  proposed  to 
make  physical  existence  merely  the  occa- 
sion for  entering  upon  a  supernatural  life. 
The  fulfilment  of  this  high  purpose  de- 
pended, nevertheless,  upon  the  possession 
and  use  of  physical  existence.  Hence, 
man's  will  while  seeking  a  supernatural 
good  could  not  free  itself  from  dependence 
upon  nature  and  natural  existence.  Man 
must  at  least  exist  as  a  natural  being  before 
he  can  attain  supernatural  reality.  Al- 
though he  proposes  to  use  his  physical  ex- 
istence merely  as  the  occasion  for  gaining  a 
foothold  in  the  supernatural  sphere,  still  it 
is  indispensable  as  a  foothold;  without  it  he 
cannot  so  much  as  enter  the  spiritual  king- 
dom. Moreover,  the  vast  majority  of  men 
need  more  than  bare  existence,  mere  life,  in 


174        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

order  even  to  seek  spiritual  goods.  Bodily 
health,  with  some  degree  of  comfort  and 
leisure,  must  first  exist  before  the  powers 
of  conceptual  thought  and  constructive 
imagination  required  for  the  comprehension 
of  spiritual  principles,  can  be  effectively  ex- 
ercised. There  are  exceptional  cases,  to  be 
sure,  of  men  possessed  of  great  constitu- 
tional vigor,  power  of  endurance,  and 
strength  of  will,  who  are  able  to  retain  in- 
tellectual poise  and  continue  philosophic 
meditation  in  spite  of  suffering  due  to  dis- 
ease or  persecution  or  compulsory  toil. 
But  such  cases  are  exceptional;  most  men 
require  a  measure  of  physical  well-being 
before  they  can  begin  spiritual  attainment. 
Hence  the  supernatural  life  fails  in  its  at- 
tempt to  escape  altogether  from  natural 
evils.  Indeed,  it  exposes  itself  in  a  special 
degree  to  the  blighting  eflFect  of  physical 
ills,  for  its  very  unwilhngness  to  take 
care  to  provide  for  future  health  and  com- 
fort, its  deliberate  neglect  of  the  conditions 
of  physical  well-being,  which  follow  logi- 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  175 

cally  from  its  contempt  for  all  natural 
goods,  expose  it  in  an  exceptional  way  to 
interference  and  interruption  from  natural 
ills.  The  ills  of  the  flesh,  the  pains  of  cold 
and  hunger  and  disease,  remind  philoso- 
pher and  saint  that  they  are  but  men  after 
all,  and  compel  them  to  descend  from  the 
lofty  heights  of  rational  reflection  and  spir- 
itual ecstasy  to  grovel  in  the  mire  of  physi- 
cal necessity.  Nor  does  the  seeker  after 
supernatural  goods  free  himself  from  the 
hostile  influence  of  that  other  species  of  evil 
which  has  its  source  in  the  conflict  of  inter- 
ests among  human  individuals.  Despising 
as  he  does  the  physical  enjoyments  which 
other  men  seek,  and  endeavoring  to  elim- 
inate from  his  character  all  those  natural 
desires,  including  those  instincts,  sexual, 
parental,  and  social,  which  bind  into  fel- 
lowship the  members  of  family  and  com- 
munity, he  is  carried  by  his  intellectual 
preoccupation  more  and  more  out  of  sym- 
pathy and  understanding  with  the  com- 
mon run  of  men.     The  only  other  human 


176        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

beings  whom  he  deems  worthy  of  his  seri- 
ous attention  are  those  who  are  capable 
of  entering  into  his  thoughts  and  discuss- 
ing the  problems  which  absorb  him.  Hence 
a  special  form  of  selfishness  is  produced 
by  supernaturalism,  by  other-worldliness — 
a  spiritual  pride,  an  exclusiveness  and  self- 
sufficiency  which  makes  its  exponents  ob- 
livious to  the  sufferings  as  well  as  to  the 
worldly  ambitions  of  their  fellows  and,  in 
its  final  development,  makes  them  willing 
to  gain  the  comfort  and  ease  favorable  to 
spiritual  culture,  through  the  toil  and  pri- 
vation of  their  fellows. 

Certainly  we  should  not  be  surprised  to 
find  that  the  faith  which  sustains  the  lofty 
aspirations  of  the  supernatural  life  wavers 
in  the  face  of  such  difficulties.  Compelled 
by  unavoidable  physical  ills  to  admit  the 
stubborn,  nay,  the  pressing  reality  of  the 
natural  world,  it  is  not  to  be  wondered  at 
that  men  began  to  doubt  of  the  reality  of 
any  other  sphere.  In  a  moment  of  spir- 
itual vision  men  get  a  glimpse  of  a  more 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  177 

comprehensive  and  enduring  reality  and, 
filled  with  noble  enthusiasm,  they  resolve  to 
abandon  all  natural  goods  and  find  perma- 
nent home  for  their  souls  in  the  supernat- 
ural realm.  But,  in  later  years,  after  the 
exigencies  of  physical  existence  have  forced 
them  into  constant  entanglement  with  mat- 
ter, the  light  fades  from  the  objects  of  spir- 
itual vision.  The  supernatural  sphere  be- 
comes, in  contrast  to  the  material  world, 
unreal  and  insubstantial;  it  seems  only  a 
fancy,  made  of  the  stuiSF  dreams  are  made 
of — ^and  faith  in  it  fails.  In  such  spiritual 
crises,  when  will  seems  in  danger,  through 
the  failure  of  its  ideals,  of  losing  confidence 
in  itself,  we  have  found  it  drawing  from 
religion  new  strength  and  courage.  Thus  it 
ever  has  been  in  human  progress,  and  thus 
it  was  in  the  case  of  the  supernatural  life; 
we  see  those  schools  of  ancient  thought 
which  had  condemned  all  natural  goods  as 
transient  and  uncertain,  and  sought  in  the 
spiritual  world  for  an  abiding  reality,  turn 
in  the  closing  centuries  of  the  ancient  era 


178        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

to  religion,  in  the  hope  of  strengthening 
their  faiUng  faith.  They  looked  to  religion 
for  some  divine  revelation  which  should 
demonstrate  the  reahty  of  the  spiritual 
world.  They  felt  the  need  of  a  revelation 
which  should  come  with  authority,  not  the 
kind  of  authority  possessed  by  the  conclu- 
sions of  human  reason,  but  an  authority  wit- 
nessed in  the  physical  world  by  signs  and 
wonders,  by  divine  interpositions  and  mi- 
raculous happenings.  Consequently,  men 
of  high  purpose  and  philosophic  train- 
ing in  the  Grseco-Roman  world  interested 
themselves  in  various  Oriental  religions, 
desiring  to  receive  from  the  miracles  and 
wonders  which  their  exponents  related  or 
were  reputed  to  perform  some  convincing 
evidence  of  the  existence  and  power  of  the 
supernatural.  Most  promising  of  all  these 
religions  was  that  of  the  Hebrews.  For  the 
Jewish  scriptures  professed  to  reveal  not 
only  the  character  of  the  supreme  spiritual 
being,  but  also  to  record  its  successive  ap- 
pearances to  men.     The  superiority  of  such 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  179 

historic  revelation  to  any  philosophical 
argument  in  convincing  men  of  the  exis- 
tence of  the  supernatural,  and  in  arousing 
them  to  the  pursuit  of  spiritual  goods,  could 
not  be  gainsaid.  An  attempt  was  actually 
made  to  combine  Greek  philosophy  with 
Hebrew  theology;  a  curious  system  of  be- 
liefs was  formulated  in  which  the  Hebrew 
God  with  the  archangels  and  angels  who 
do  his  will,  was  identified  with  the  Platonic 
hierarchy  of  ideas. 

It  was  the  Christian  religion,  however, 
whose  advent  at  a  critical  time  suppUed  the 
doctrine  of  the  supernatural  life  with  that 
reinforcement  necessary  to  convert  it  into 
one  of  the  great  civilizing  influences  in  the 
world's  history.  To  the  ancient  world 
which  was  seeking  in  vain  some  support  for 
its  waning  faith  in  spiritual  values,  Chris- 
tianity came  with  its  message  of  an  author- 
itative revelation  of  supernatural  reahty. 
The  authority  of  this  revelation  was  at- 
tested, its  exponents  maintained,  by  the 
supernatural  origin  of  Jesus,  by  the  mira- 


180        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

cles  he  performed,  by  his  resurrection  from 
the  dead.  It  was  further  witnessed  by  the 
miracles  and  theophanies  of  the  Hebrew 
dispensation,  culminating  as  this  was  said 
to  do,  in  Jesus,  the  promised  Messiah.  In 
content  Christianity  was  a  revelation  of 
the  nature  and  will  of  God.  In  the  person 
and  teaching  of  Christ,  God  was  revealed  as 
a  Spirit  possessed  of  infinite  reality  and 
absolute  moral  perfection.  The  lofty  ethi- 
cal monotheism  which  developed  out  of  the 
Hebrew  religion  after  it  had  been  purified 
in  the  fire  of  national  calamity  and  refined 
by  ages  of  religious  meditation,  received  in 
the  life  and  death  of  Jesus  an  expression 
sufficiently  dramatic  and  appealing  to  win 
in  the  course  of  a  few  centuries  the  atten- 
tion of  the  civilized  world.  This  fresh  reve- 
lation of  supernatural  reality  was  eagerly 
seized  upon  by  ancient  society,  sick  as  it 
was  of  the  natural  world  and  its  transient 
joys,  and  yearning  for  an  abiding  spiritual 
home.  It  was  of  necessity  interpreted  by 
Greek  and  Roman  thinkers  in  terms  of  their 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  181 

own  thought,  i,  e,,  the  conceptions  of  Greek 
philosophy.  God  was  characteristically  con- 
ceived in  the  Hebrew  religion  as  sharply 
separated  by  his  personality  and  moral  will 
from  the  natural  world.  This  the  divine 
transcendence,  taught  as  a  matter  of  course 
by  the  Christian  gospel,  was  interpreted  in 
terms  of  the  Platonic  and  Neo-Platonic 
philosophy.  God's  moral  perfection  was 
understood  as  his  freedom  from  all  entan- 
glement with  matter — ^his  pure  immaterial- 
ity. The  need  for  a  mediator  was  then 
apparent  if  this  transcendent  deity  was  to 
exert  any  influence  upon  the  material 
world.  This  was  the  office  assigned  to 
Jesus:  he  was  identified  with  the  Logos,  the 
divine  reason  immanent  in  the  world. 

Here,  then,  was  a  God  whose  existence 
guaranteed  the  reality  of  the  spiritual 
world.  For  supernaturalism  conceives  the 
spiritual  world  not  dynamically  but  stati- 
cally, as  a  complete,  an  eternal,  a  perfected 
whole.  It  is,  therefore,  absolutely  divorced 
from  the  natural  world,  where  everything 


182        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

changes  and  nothing  is  final.  Between  the 
two  worlds,  lower  and  higher,  is  fixed  a  gulf 
of  absolute  opposition.  The  one  is  irre- 
trievably material,  the  other  is  trium- 
phantly spiritual;  the  one  is  changing,  the 
other  permanent;  the  one  is  fragmentary, 
the  other  complete;  the  one  is  discordant, 
the  other  harmonious.  In  order  that  su- 
pernaturalism  should  enlist  in  its  service  all 
the  resources  of  religious  faith,  the  dualism 
in  question  had  to  find  expression  in  a  new 
conception  of  God.  This  was  achieved  by 
mediaeval  Christianity,  when  it  conceived  of 
God  as  characterized  essentially  by  his 
purity,  his  freedom  from  any  stain  or  lim- 
itation of  matter.  To  the  attributes  of 
power  and  justice,  which  in  preceding 
stages  of  religious  evolution  had  been 
ascribed  to  God,  was  now  added  holiness. 
This  quality  overshadowed  the  other  two, 
expressing  as  it  did  God's  essential  and 
perfect  spirituality.  Converting  the  ideals 
of  supernaturalism  into  the  sovereign 
reality,    this    conception    of    God    trans- 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  183 

formed  at  one  stroke  an  idealistic  philoso- 
phy, comprehensible  only  to  a  select  few, 
into  a  potent  morahzing  force. 

Christianity  offered  to  all  men  salvation 
from  the  sins  and  sorrows  of  the  natural 
life  and  assurance  of  eternal  reality.  The 
plan  of  salvation  had  its  source  in  the  pur- 
pose of  God,  for  Him  completely  realized;  it 
was  revealed  and  executed  by  Christ,  the 
divinely  appointed  mediator.  With  the 
mediaeval  theory  of  salvation,  the  philos- 
ophy of  the  Incarnation  and  Atonement 
then  formulated  and  standardized,  we  are 
not  here  concerned.  For  us  it  is  suflScient 
to  note  that  through  faith  in  Christ  and 
compliance  with  the  requirements  of  the 
Church,  the  authorized  representative  of 
Christ  on  earth,  the  human  individual  was 
supposed  to  obtain  divine  grace  sufficient  to 
save  him  from  the  destruction  that  awaits 
everything  earthly,  and  to  secure  his  adop- 
tion into  the  spiritual  kingdom.  Once  saved 
from  the  evils  of  the  natural  life,  the  inter- 
est of  man  was  withdrawn  from  earthly 


184        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

concerns  and  centred  upon  the  spiritual 
world.  He  was  encouraged  to  neglect 
worldly  afifairs  and  to  abandon  natural 
goods;  he  was  led  to  look  upon  this  world 
as  a  temporary  halting-place  in  his  pilgrim- 
age to  a  heavenly  home.  Commerce  and 
industry  ceased,  therefore,  to  appeal;  social 
relationships  (except  those  of  ecclesiastical 
origin)  lost  their  significance.  Material 
advancement  ceased;  social  progress  was 
checked.  Religion  with  its  direct  outlook 
upon  the  supernatural  was  regarded  as  the 
proper  vocation  of  man,  and  the  true  re- 
hgious  life  was  understood  to  be  that  of 
secluded  meditation  and  prayer. 

However  unreal  the  natural  world  may 
appear,  however  insignificant  its  happen- 
ings when  contrasted  with  the  abiding 
reality  and  eternal  significance  of  the  super- 
natural, nevertheless  nature  does  exist  and 
the  events  of  human  history  have  occurred. 
As  actual  facts  they  demand  from  the  ex- 
ponent of  supernaturalism  some  explana- 
tion in  terms  of  his  own  faith.     This  ex- 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  185 

planation  was  furnished  in  the  cosmology 
and  philosophy  of  history  formulated  by 
the  early  Christian  fathers  and  theologians. 
In  accounting  for  the  existence  of  the  nat- 
ural world,  mediaeval  theology  adopted  the 
cosmogony  of  the  Hebrew  scriptures.  The 
world  was  created  out  of  nothing  by  God 
in  six  days;  each  distinct  form  of  Ufe  was 
specially  created;  man  was  made  by  God 
in  His  own  image,  designed  thus  to  be  the 
lord  of  all  creation.  For  man,  the  Divine 
Creator  made  special  laws,  obedience  to 
which  would  insure  him  of  a  life  of  perfect 
bUss.  But  tempted  by  Satan,  a  fallen 
angel  who  had  led  in  rebellion  against  the 
authority  of  the  Most  High,  the  first  man 
Adam  disobeyed  God's  law,  fell  from  divine 
grace,  and  incurred  the  punishment  of  sin. 
The  curse  of  sin  was  transmitted  from  our 
first  parents  to  the  whole  human  race.  All 
men  are  born  depraved;  consequently  they 
suffer  the  fatigue  of  constant  and  often  un- 
availing toil,  the  pain  of  disability  and  dis- 
ease, the  fear  of  certainly  impending  death. 


186        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

Hence  the  melancholy  record  of  human 
history;  of  man's  futile  strivings  for  power 
and  pleasure,  of  his  unspeakable  cruelties 
to  his  fellow-man,  of  his  degradation  and 
bestiality,  of  his  grovelling  terror  and  inde- 
scribable sufferings.  But  God  did  not  en- 
tirely withdraw  his  favor  from  man;  His 
eternal  purpose  which  embraced  man's 
creation  and  his  fall  included,  also,  a  plan 
for  his  salvation.  Thus  in  a  world  envel- 
oped in  the  darkness  of  sin  a  feeble  light 
was  kindled  and  kept  burning,  handed 
down  the  hue  of  Hebrew  patriarchs  and 
prophets  until  the  divinely  appointed  time 
when  it  should  blaze  forth  and  illuminate 
the  world.  This  time,  the  turning-point  in 
the  world's  history,  was  that  of  the  birth  of 
Christ,  who  was  the  Son  of  God  and  took 
on  human  flesh  in  order  to  save  men  from 
the  curse  of  sin.  Through  His  life  and 
teachings,  Christ  revealed  the  will  of  God 
to  man;  through  His  death.  He  made 
the  necessary  atonement  for  human  sin. 
Thenceforth  the  way  was  opened  for  man 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  187 

to  escape  from  all  the  ills  of  natural  exis- 
tence and  obtain  eternal  life.  The  body  of 
Christ's  followers,  organized  as  the  Chris- 
tian Church,  continued  as  His  representa- 
tive on  earth.  Thus  the  Church  became 
the  visible  embodiment  of  the  supernat- 
ural reality  ;  her  authority  was  supreme 
over  all  temporal  powers,  all  earthly  king- 
doms; she  held  the  keys  of  heaven,  for 
through  her  sacraments  only  came  that 
divine  grace  necessary  for  human  regenera- 
tion and  sanctification.  In  the  life  of  the 
Church,  in  fact,  as  the  communion  of  those 
saved  and  sustained  by  divine  grace,  man 
enters  that  supernatural  life  which  is  not 
terminated  but  rather  fulfilled  by  physical 
death.  The  mediaeval  philosophy  of  his- 
tory, thus  barely  outlined,  gives  to  the 
faith  and  ideals  of  the  supernatural  life  their 
final  historic  expression.  There  is  some- 
thing majestic  in  the  sweep  of  this,  the  first 
real  philosophy  of  human  history;  the  tale 
it  tells  is  sombre  enough,  but  dramatic 
in  its  idyllic   opening,  its  tragic  plot,  its 


188        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

tremendous  denouement,  and  possessed 
through  its  starthng  contrasts  and  remorse- 
less consistency  of  a  grandeur  really  awe- 
some.. The  imagination  is  stirred  by  the 
thought  of  the  Christian  sage  who,  in  the 
closing  years  of  the  Roman  Empire,  with 
civihzation  crumbling  beneath  his  feet, 
with  disorder  and  carnage  all  about  him, 
surveys  with  untroubled  eye  the  whole 
course  of  human  history  from  creation  until 
the  end  of  the  world.  Looking  back  over 
the  recent  period  of  ancient  history  to  re- 
moter prehistoric  times,  he  sees  in  the  rise 
and  fall  of  kingdoms  nothing  but  the  vain 
and  futile  strivings  of  the  Empire  of  This 
World,  necessarily  transient  and  marked 
by  sin  and  sorrow.  Turning  his  gaze  for- 
ward and  peering  into  the  future,  which  to 
the  natural  vision  is  dark  and  menacing, 
with  its  threat  of  barbarian  inundation  and 
civilization  extinguished,  his  eye  remains 
serene  and  untroubled,  for  his  spiritual 
vision  foresees  the  triumphant  progress  of 
the  Church,  the  City  of  God,  in  her  vie- 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  189 

torious  warfare  with  all  worldly  principali- 
ties and  powers. 

Thus  the  thought  of  mediaeval  Chris- 
tianity found  the  key  to  the  meaning  of 
universal  history  in  the  divine  plan  of 
redemption.  In  perfect  consistency  with 
the  standpoint  of  supematuralism,  it  was 
in  this  way  enabled  to  explain  all  existing 
facts  teleologically,  through  their  bearing 
upon  the  supreme  concern  of  man's  salva- 
tion. Causal  determination,  which  for  nat- 
uralism was  a  sufficient  explanation  of 
everything  that  happened,  was  by  super- 
naturalism  almost  entirely  ignored.  In  the 
causal  sequences  which  relate  natural  events 
among  themselves,  supematuralism  had  lit- 
tle if  any  interest,  and  not  the  slightest 
tendency  to  explore  them;  these  events  oc- 
curred only  to  fulfil  God's  will,  and  this 
divine  purpose  furnished  their  complete 
explanation.  Such  objects  and  events  as 
could  not  by  any  stretch  of  the  imagination 
be  thought  of  as  means  to  the  one  great  end 
were  interpreted  as  emblems  or  symbols  of 


190        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

great  spiritual  truths  connected  with  hu- 
man redemption.  No  more  striking  exem- 
pUfication  can  be  found  of  the  power  of  an 
intellectual  presupposition  completely  to 
dominate  human  thought  and  to  exclude  all 
other  interests.  Blind  to  the  most  ele- 
mentary facts  of  nature,  mediaeval  thought 
found  food  for  endless  speculation  in  its 
supposed  symbolism.  The  eagle,  the  dove, 
the  serpent,  the  lion,  about  whose  structures 
and  Ufe-habits  there  was  profoundest  igno- 
rance, were  nevertheless  dwelt  upon  as 
symbols  of  spiritual  objects  and  spiritual 
processes.  The  sea,  about  whose  bound- 
aries, depths,  and  tides  next  to  nothing  was 
known,  was  interesting  as  a  symbol  of  the 
human  heart  tossed  about  by  gusts  of  pas- 
sion, traversed  by  waves  of  impulse. 

Of  the  faults  of  supernaturalism  little 
more  need  be  said.  The  type  of  life  en- 
couraged by  its  principles  and  ideals  has 
already  been  indicated.  With  all  its  faults, 
it  has  a  splendor  of  its  own,  witnessing  as  it 
does  to  the  power  of  the  ideal  over  the 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  191 

human  soul.  While  its  one-sidedness  and 
exaggeration  doomed  it  to  certain  decay, 
it  constitutes  a  necessary  stage  in  human 
progress,  since  it  achieved  results  of  per- 
manent value.  It  enlarged  the  horizons  of 
human  life  by  creating  for  the  will  of  man 
the  ideal  of  a  spiritual  good,  an  eternal  life, 
which  in  spite  of  his  return  to  nature  and 
worldly  pursuits  he  can  never  forget  nor 
cease  to  yearn  after.  Nor  should  the  effi- 
cacy of  supernaturahsm  as  a  civilizing 
agency  during  the  dark  ages  of  transition 
and  turmoil  be  overlooked  or  underesti- 
mated. For  those  who  were  permitted  by 
circumstances  to  make  the  most  of  their 
spiritual  opportunities  in  pursuit  of  a  relig- 
ious vocation,  it  meant,  as  we  have  seen, 
withdrawal  from  the  Ufe  of  action  and  of 
service  to  the  seclusion  of  the  monastery, 
where  free  from  all  worldly  distractions 
they  could  continue  by  meditation  and  by 
prayer  to  fit  themselves  for  the  heavenly 
Ufe.  Action  entered  these  cloistered  lives 
only  in  connection  with  the  ritual  and  ser- 


192        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

vice  of  the  Church.  Such  a  Ufe,  pursued 
by  all  members  of  the  race,  would  of  course 
have  brought  human  existence  and  with  it 
human  progress  to  a  speedy  close.  But, 
fortunately,  the  great  majority  of  men 
could  not  thus  make  reUgion  a  vocation. 
It  was,  rather,  an  addition  to  their  every- 
day lives — ^lives  that  in  those  turbulent 
times  were  vivid  and  absorbing  enough. 
Moreover,  the  barbarians  of  northern  Eu- 
rope, whom  it  was  the  mission  of  the  Church 
to  educate  and  civilize,  did  not  possess 
powers  of  reflective  thought  or  logical  for- 
mulation sufficient  to  give  such  ideas  of 
spiritual  reaUty  as  they  might  be  led  to 
form  any  revolutionary  significance.  Their 
natural  interest  in  the  world  of  every-day 
affairs  was  not  disturbed  by  the  beliefs  they 
acquired  concerning  the  supernatural.  The 
supernatural  world  was  to  them  another 
world  added  to  this  one — a  celestial  realm, 
it  is  true,  but  in  fundamental  structure 
analogous  to  the  life  on  earth.  God  was  its 
monarch,  mightier  than  any  earthly  poten- 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  193 

tate,  but  resembling  in  all  essentials  the 
monarchs  of  this  world.  But  the  existence 
of  the  celestial  world  and  the  prospect  of  a 
supernatural  Ufe  furnished  powerful  incen- 
tives to  right  conduct — ^and  this  was  a  very 
important  matter. 

As  an  attempt  to  provide  complete  and 
final  satisfaction  for  the  human  will,  the 
supernatural  Hfe  did  not,  even  with  the  re- 
inforcement of  rehgious  belief,  succeed. 
The  problem  of  evil,  still  unsolved,  re- 
mained as  the  reef  destined  to  wreck  this 
third  type  of  life  with  its  high  pretensions 
and  lofty  ideals.  The  attempt  of  mediaeval 
Christianity  to  overcome  actual  evils,  nat- 
ural and  social,  by  ignoring  them  was  an 
utter  failure.  Inattention  to  natural  ob- 
jects and  ignorance  of  natural  laws  brought 
a  heavy  penalty  of  suffering  and  degrada- 
tion. Disease  raged  unchecked  because  the 
laws  of  health  were  neglected;  famine 
threatened  because  the  methods  of  produc- 
tion were  unimproved;  disasters  from  fire 
and  flood  and  storm  were  unabated,  be- 


194        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

cause  ignorance  of  natural  causes  made 
precaution  and  prevention  impossible. 
Thus  supernaturalism  as  a  mode  of  living 
defeated  its  own  ends,  for  many  lives  with 
splendid  spiritual  possibilities  were  pre- 
maturely cut  off,  or  spiritually  deadened, 
by  hardship  and  pain.  In  the  social 
sphere,  also,  the  inabihty  of  supernaturalism 
to  remove  the  conflict  of  interests  among 
individuals  and  bring  about  a  fair  adjust- 
ment, proved  destructive  of  its  own  aims. 
Its  failure  to  establish  social  justice  is  noto- 
rious; it  encouraged  the  growth  of  spiritual 
aristocracy,  and  ultimately  of  a  social  aris- 
tocracy as  well.  Unable  to  pursue  the  life 
of  worship  and  prayer  and  communion 
which  the  religious  vocation  required,  un- 
less freed  from  the  toil  and  care  of  providing 
for  physical  sustenance  and  comfort,  those 
who  were  prompted  to  seek  the  fruits  of 
the  spiritual  Ufe  grew  increasingly  willing  to 
receive  their  support  from  the  labor  of  the 
greater  number  who  were  condemned  to 
toil  unceasingly,  without  opportunity  for  a 


THE  SUPERNATURAL  LIFE  195 

rudimentary  spiritual  culture.  And  when 
this  spiritual  aristocracy  found  it  could 
make  its  position  more  secure  politically 
by  alliance  with  an  hereditary  social  aris- 
tocracy which  gained  the  chance  for  intel- 
lectual and  aesthetic  culture  through  sub- 
jecting the  mass  of  men  to  the  hmitations 
of  inferior  social  status,  and  then  appropri- 
ating the  products  of  their  labor,  it  did  not 
hesitate  to  do  so.  Nay  more,  the  repre- 
sentatives of  supernaturalism  were  willing 
to  strengthen  the  authority  of  a  corrupt 
social  aristocracy  by  hypocritically  admon- 
ishing the  subject  classes  to  be  content  with 
their  lot,  since  earthly  possessions  and  plea- 
sures were  transient  and  unreal,  while  heav- 
enly bhss  was  the  sure  reward  of  every 
man  who  proved  submissive  to  the  powers 
of  Church  and  state.  Become  thus  the 
apologist  for  social  injustice,  supernatural- 
ism was  certain  to  fall,  and  its  fall  was  de- 
served. 

But  supernaturalism   is  not  simply  su- 
perseded in  the  onward  march  of  human 


196        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

progress.  Its  results  are  assimilated;  they 
become  a  permanent  acquisition  of  human 
nature.  Man,  upon  whom  the  spiritual 
vision  has  once  dawned,  never  entirely  es- 
capes from  its  uplifting  influence.  The  light 
of  the  eternal,  having  once  shone  upon 
the  scene  of  earth,  leaves  it  with  altered 
perspective  and  enlarged  horizons.  The 
appeal  of  the  supernatural  may  only  be  felt 
on  special  occasions,  but  it  leaves  us  per- 
manently upHfted  and  ennobled.  Perhaps 
it  is  when  we  behold  some  sublime  natural 
spectacle  or  simply  view  a  peaceful  sunset 
sky,  possibly  it  is  when  we  are  stirred  by 
the  beauty  and  majesty  of  a  great  cathedral 
or  join  joyfully  in  the  worship  of  Christmas 
or  Easter  tide — on  such  rare  occasions  the 
concerns  of  every-day  life  retreat  into  the 
background  of  shadow  and  our  souls  rise 
up  and  lay  hold  on  eternal  reality. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE 

Human  progress  is  due  to  the  irresistible 
expansive  power  of  the  human  will;  un- 
daunted by  failure,  it  turns  every  defeat 
into  a  victory  by  striving  with  renewed 
faith  to  conquer  and  annex  still  more  ex- 
tensive fields  of  satisfaction.  Failing  to 
obtain  the  objects  of  present  desire,  it  seeks 
to  make  sure  of  future  well-being  and  enjoy- 
ment. Thwarted  in  this  attempt  to  pro- 
vide for  future  security  and  comfort,  it 
abandons  the  natural  world  in  an  heroic 
attempt  to  attain  an  abiding  supernatural 
good.  Unable  thus  to  take  heaven  by 
storm,  it  endeavors  to  realize  an  end  which 
shall  unite  both  natural  and  supernatural 
goods — aiming  in  this  new  venture  at  once 
to  convert  material  acquisitions  into  a 
means  of  spiritual  attainment,  and  to  de- 

197 


198        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

rive  from  spiritual  sources  power  for  the 
transformation  of  natural  conditions.  This 
final  end,  which  may  fitly  be  termed  univer- 
sal, is  sought  by  the  modern  spirit. 

It  is  easy  to  misunderstand  the  modern 
spirit  as  merely  a  relapse  into  naturalism. 
For  we  seem  to  see  the  modem  world  ab- 
sorbed in  an  attempt  to  secure  material 
convenience  and  enjoyment  through  the 
control  of  physical  forces  and  the  direction 
of  social  influences.  But  this  interpretation 
stops  at  the  surface  and  utterly  fails  to 
understand  the  great  underlying  principles 
of  modem  civilization.  The  modern  spirit 
diflfers  from  naturalism,  first  in  the  ideal 
which  it  proposes  for  realization,  and,  sec- 
ond, in  the  method  by  which  it  undertakes 
to  realize  this  ideal. 

The  ideal  of  modern  civilization  is  not 
limited,  like  that  of  naturalism,  to  the  sat- 
isfactions of  individual  existence  and  com- 
munity life.  The  good  which  it  seeks  ex- 
tends in  its  range  beyond  the  narrow  boun- 
daries of  local  community  interest  to  the 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  199 

larger  national  life,  and  the  life  of  the  mod- 
ern nation  presents  a  variety  of  activities 
almost  endless  and  a  complexity  of  interests 
well-nigh  infinite.  But  it  overleaps,  also, 
the  limits  of  national  welfare,  and  embraces 
international  comity  and  well-being,  ex- 
tending thus  to  the  lives  of  all  men  of  every 
race  and  clime.  Nor  does  it  confine  itself 
to  the  humanity  of  the  present  age  or  gen- 
eration, but  has  regard  for  man's  develop- 
ment and  satisfaction  throughout  the  long 
reaches  of  the  future.  Man's  effort  to  at- 
tain by  sheer  force  of  spiritual  insight  to  a 
supernatural  reality  proves  to  be  not  a 
disorderly  dream,  forgotten  on  awakening; 
it  leaves  him  with  an  outlook  permanently 
altered.  For  the  human  will  in  the  broad 
light  of  modern  day  still  seeks  a  spiritual 
kingdom,  not  a  Heavenly  City  perhaps,  but  a 
spiritual  community  whose  life  shall  furnish 
to  every  man  the  opportunity  for  per- 
sonal development  and  satisfaction.  More- 
over, Christian  other-worldliness  and  ascet- 
icism have  left  their  permanent  mark  upon 


200        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

the  moral  will  of  the  modern  man;  for  deep- 
rooted  in  his  heart  the  conviction  abides 
that  the  highest  human  good  has  a  content 
so  comprehensive,  so  far-reaching,  as  to 
demand  the  surrender  of  every  individual 
interest.  The  profound  Christian  doctrine 
of  self-sacrifice  is  firmly  intrenched  in  mod- 
ern ethics.  Modern  humanitarianism  is 
occasionally  disparaged  as  visionary  and 
sentimental,  as  the  well-meant  but  ab- 
surdly impracticable  proposal  to  make 
everybody  materially  prosperous  and 
happy.  But  to  treat  with  superior  or  cyn- 
ical disdain  this  ideal,  even  in  its  cruder 
expressions,  is  to  play  the  traitor  to  man's 
highest  interest,  for  in  its  universalism  it 
represents  the  noblest  aspiration  of  the 
human  will. 

In  the  method  of  realizing  its  ideal,  mod- 
ernism returns  to  grapple  anew  with  physi- 
cal forces  and  social  conditions.  Here  we 
do  have  a  return  to  naturalism — but  with  a 
noteworthy  difference.  The  natural  man 
seeks,  through  observing  and  utilizing  the 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  201 

obvious  sequences  of  nature,  to  reach  the 
results  at  which  he  aims.  Modem  inteUi- 
gence,  on  the  contrary,  proposes  through 
study  and  experiment  to  analyze  physical 
forces  and  social  tendencies  into  their  ele- 
mentary components,  and  then  to  recom- 
bine  them  in  such  a  way  that  they  shall 
with  unfailing  certainty  produce  the  results 
which  universal  human  welfare  requires. 

Modern  civilization  is  the  vastest  enter- 
prise ever  undertaken  by  the  human  will. 
Supernaturalism  was  a  bold  venture,  it  is 
true;  it  wins  our  admiration  through  the 
very  height  of  its  pretensions.  But  since 
the  supernatural  good  was  exalted  far  above 
all  worldly  events  and  concerns,  it  took  on 
an  exclusive  character,  shutting  out  from 
its  ken  the  disturbing  refractory  forces  of 
nature  and  all  such  human  individuals  as 
possessed  neither  intellectual  grasp  nor 
spiritual  insight.  Its  ideal  was  the  Ufe  of  a 
spiritual  aristocracy.  In  contrast  to  this, 
the  end  sought  by  the  moral  will  which  is 
behind  modern  civilization  appalls  by  its 


202       FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

very  scope  and  magnitude.  It  proposes  to 
utilize  every  natural  force,  every  social  in- 
fluence, in  the  establishment  of  a  social 
community  whose  life  shall  be  large  and 
varied  enough  to  provide  for  the  develop- 
ment and  satisfaction  of  every  human  indi- 
vidual. Here  in  this  final  stage  of  human 
progress  we  behold  the  human  will  ventur- 
ing to  seek  a  life  which  is  truly  universal. 

The  faith  which  the  pursuit  of  such  a 
universal  good  calls  for  on  the  part  of 
modern  man  is  greater  than  that  hitherto 
exercised  by  the  human  will.  The  faith 
characteristic  of  supernaturalism  is  noble, 
ardent,  pure — surpassing  in  these  quahties 
any  previous  aspiration  of  man.  This 
noble  purity,  this  consuming  zeal,  is  the 
result  of  whole-souled  devotion  to  a  sublime 
spiritual  ideal.  But  supernaturalism  is  able 
to  continue  absorbed  in  its  lofty  ideal  only 
because  it  deliberately  disregards  a  large 
part  of  human  experience.  Its  exalted  op- 
timism is  achieved  only  through  blindness 
to  the  ills  and  imperfections  of  the  actual 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  20S 

world.  A  faith  stronger  than  that  of  Stoic 
sage  or  mediaeval  mystic  is,  therefore,  re- 
quired of  one  who  faces  the  facts  of  the  ex- 
isting world,  who  understands  its  contra- 
dictions and  maladjustments,  its  cruel  and 
clumsy  processes,  its  bloodshed  and  car- 
nage, its  brutality  and  cunning;  and  yet 
dares  to  believe  that  it  may  be  made  a 
means  to  the  realization  of  a  universal 
spiritual  ideal.  To  look  without  flinching 
upon  the  facts  of  existence,  to  maintain 
the  possibility  of  converting  the  agencies 
of  nature  into  instruments  of  personal  de- 
velopment and  to  undertake  the  task  of 
realizing  the  Ideal  in  the  actual  world,  calls 
for  a  faith  so  resolute,  a  fortitude  so  unfal- 
tering as  to  daunt  any  but  the  strongest 
will. 

The  postulate  through  which  this  faith 
gains  expression  is  that  of  development  or 
evolution — that  the  actual  world  contains 
"potencies  of  adaptation  and  growth,  of  which 
human  intelligence  may  avail  itself  in  the 
establishment  of  a  universal  spiritual  life. 


204        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

This  is  the  last  and  highest  of  the  four  pos- 
tulates upon  which  human  progress  rests. 
Primitive  Hfe  depends  upon  belief  in  the 
existence  of  things  which  are  centres  and 
sources  of  characteristic  qualities.  The 
natural  life  owes  its  advance  over  primitive 
conditions  to  the  further  belief  that  events 
are  determined  in  their  occurrence  by  pre- 
vious events,  their  causes.  The  supernat- 
ural life  is  made  possible  by  the  added  be- 
lief to  which  reflection  gives  rise,  that 
objects  and  events  owe  their  character  to 
the  ends  they  subserve.  The  universal  life 
rests  upon  a  final  and  culminating  belief 
in  development  or  self-determination — a  be- 
lief that  objects  derive  actuality  and  signifi- 
cance not  simply  from  the  causes  which 
produce  them  or  from  the  ends  which  they 
subserve,  but  also  from  their  own  intrinsic 
potencies  of  growth  and  expression;  that 
actual  objects  are  in  a  real  and  important 
sense  self-caused  in  that  they  are  capable, 
under  stress  of  inner  tension  or  outer  stimu- 
lus, of  manifesting  new  qualities  and  powers. 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  205 

This  capacity  for  growth  and  self-develop- 
ment is  strikingly  manifested  in  the  organic 
realm  by  the  multitude  of  forms  and  the 
variety  of  activities  originated  by  the  life- 
force — ^forms  and  activities  which  in  ap- 
pearance are  new  and,  from  previous 
observation,  unpredictable.  But  this  ca- 
pacity for  self-development  comes  first  to 
full  expression  as  the  power  of  freedom  and 
creativity  in  the  mind  and  will  of  man.  It 
is  the  principle  of  progress  itself,  and  its 
final  adoption  as  a  ruling  belief  by  the 
human  will  means  that  the  spirit  of  prog- 
ress has  finally  become  seK-conscious.  Ex- 
plicitly adopted  as  a  postulate,  it  means 
that  the  human  will  has  come  to  conscious 
recognition  of  its  power  of  originating  new 
ends  for  pursuit  and  of  discovering  in  actual 
objects  and  conditions  new  possibilities  of 
service  and  satisfaction. 

Human  volition,  at  the  present  high- 
water  mark  of  its  development,  thus  aims 
at  such  adjustment  of  forces  in  nature  and 
such  organization  of  interests  in  society  as 


206        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

will  make  possible  the  establishment  of  a 
universal  social  life.  This  is  pre-eminently 
a  programme  of  action,  and  it  is  a  fact  that 
modern  civilization  is  distinguished  from 
medisevalism  by  its  abandonment  of  con- 
templation for  action.  In  its  emphasis 
upon  accomplishment  and  efficiency  the 
modern  spirit  harks  back  to  the  "practi- 
caUty"  of  naturalism,  and  seems  to  the  ex- 
ponent of  classical  culture  to  savor  not  a 
little  of  the  Phihstinism  of  the  natural  man. 
But,  as  we  have  seen,  there  is  this  impor- 
tant difference:  the  action  required  by  the 
modern  ideal  is  not  a  comparatively  simple 
routine  based  upon  empirical  observation, 
but  is  experimental  and  constructive,  be- 
cause guided  by  systematic  reflection  and 
creative  imagination.  In  fact,  the  achieve- 
ments of  modern  civiUzation  in  the  sub- 
jugation of  nature  and  the  reorganization 
of  society  are  due  directly  to  developed 
thought  and  trained  imagination,  a  devel- 
opment and  a  training  which  man's  intel- 
lectual and  imaginative  faculties  received 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  207 

during  the  classical  and  mediaeval  periods. 
For  if  man  is  to  make  new  combinations  of 
natural  forces  which  shall  produce  results 
serviceable  to  himself,  he  must  first  be  able 
to  separate  these  forces,  operating  in  a  baf- 
fling complexity,  into  their  elementary  con- 
stituents. To  do  this  he  must  not  merely 
observe,  he  must  experiment.  But  in  order 
to  experiment  he  must  be  able  beforehand 
to  frame  in  his  thought  the  questions  whose 
answer  he  is  to  seek  from  nature.  Now  to 
ask  intelligent  questions  requires  an  initial 
conception  of  a  subject  or  situation  and  a 
provisional  analysis  of  it.  Such  exercise  of 
conceptual  thought  and  analytic  under- 
standing hes,  consequently,  at  the  very 
source  of  modern  technical  achievement. 
Kepler's  epoch-making  discovery  of  the 
laws  which  govern  planetary  revolution  was 
made  possible  by  his  initial  conception  of 
the  universe  as  ordered  by  definite  quanti- 
tative relations.  Proceeding  upon  this  view 
and  with  a  knowledge  of  mathematical 
principles,   he   attempted   to   conceive   of 


208        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

every  possible  relation  that  might  apply  to 
the  orbit  of  the  planets.  This  provisional 
analysis  supplied  him  with  a  set  of  hypothe- 
ses, each  of  which  might  constitute  a  ques- 
tion to  which  observed  facts  would  return 
answer.  An  observation,  thus  originating 
in  an  hypothesis  and  returning  answer  to  a 
question,  is  essentially  experimental.  When 
the  conditions  under  which  an  event  occurs 
are  so  controlled  that  any  observer  may 
vary  them  at  will,  thus  testing  every  con- 
ceivable hypothesis  in  regard  to  their  rela- 
tion to  the  event  in  question,  we  have,  in 
the  complete  sense  of  the  term,  an  experi- 
ment. 

This  work  of  separating  the  forces  of  na- 
ture into  their  elementary  constituents,  and 
of  determining  their  essential  relations,  is, 
of  course,  but  a  preliminary  to  the  task  of 
recombining  them  in  such  ways  that  they 
may  produce  results  which  increase  the 
satisfaction  and  enlarge  the  scope  of  human 
life.  In  this  field  of  invention,  mechanical 
and  social,  the  will  of  man  has  scored  its 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  209 

most  notable  triumphs  in  modern  times. 
New  machinery  of  production  and  distribu- 
tion, of  transportation  and  communication, 
has  revolutionized  the  economic  and  indus- 
trial hfe  of  man;  new  agencies  of  govern- 
ment and  education,  of  relief  and  recrea- 
tion, have  reorganized  his  social  life.  There 
is  no  fitter  symbol  of  modern  progress  than 
the  machine.  To  assert  this  is,  in  the 
opinion  of  many  people,  tantamount  to  a 
condemnation  of  modernism.  The  promi- 
nence of  machinery  in  modern  hfe  they 
regard  as  an  ominous  indication  that  human 
society  is  being  materialized.  Such  is  a 
mistaken  view,  however;  the  invention  and 
use  of  machinery  means,  or  should  mean, 
not  that  human  hfe  is  being  materialized, 
but  that  the  material  world  is  being  spir- 
itualized. For  what  does  the  invention  of 
a  useful  machine  signify?  It  means  that 
physical  forces,  which  have  hitherto  acted 
separately  and  without  regard  for  human 
welfare,  are  so  combined  and  adjusted  by 
human  intelhgence  as  to  produce  a  new 


210        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

result,  and  one  that  is  desired  by  man  to 
enrich  the  content  of  his  Ufe.  It  means 
that  a  number  of  physical  forces,  each  of 
which  has  always  been  and  continues  to 
be  determined  by  other  forces,  quite  regard- 
less of  man's  needs  or  purposes,  are  bound 
together  by  a  new  relationship  which  man 
imposes  upon  them  when  he  makes  them 
means  to  one  end.  In  this  way  the  un- 
certainty, the  untrustworthiness  of  natural 
processes  which  rendered  futile  man's  pre- 
vious attempts  to  avail  himself  of  their 
causal  sequences  in  providing  for  his  own 
future,  and  finally  made  him  despair  of 
attaining  any  natural  good,  is  overcome. 
For  this  earlier  effort  of  man  to  control 
nature  in  his  own  interest  had  for  its  gui- 
dance only  his  observation  of  the  more 
obvious  sequences  of  natural  events — an 
observation  that  necessarily  failed  to  reveal 
all  the  conditions  of  an  event,  to  detect 
those  that  were  hidden,  and  to  distinguish 
the  part  played  by  each.  Hence  the  effect 
that  he  expected  would  follow,  and  upon 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  «11 

which  his  own  plans  depended,  was  con- 
tinually failing  to  appear,  because  of  the 
absence  of  some  necessary  condition  of 
which  he  was  ignorant.  He  knew  that  the 
growth  of  the  seed  he  had  planted  was  con- 
ditioned by  a  loosening  of  the  soil  and  the 
presence  of  moisture  and  heat  and  light, 
but  he  did  not  know  that  the  existence  of 
certain  elements  in  the  soil  was  also  a  nec- 
essary condition.  Hence  his  crop  often 
failed  unaccountably,  and  in  consequence 
he  went  hungry.  But  modern  science,  by 
its  exact  analysis  of  all  the  conditions  under 
which  natural  events  occur  is  giving  man 
certain  control,  and  the  assurance  of  suc- 
cess, in  obtaining  results  from  nature. 
Now  the  machine  represents  this  control  in 
the  acme  of  perfection.  For  here  exact 
analysis  is  made  the  basis  of  a  new  synthe- 
sis or  readjustment  of  natural  forces,  with 
the  sole  purpose  of  obtaining  from  them  a 
certain  result.  The  machine  typifies,  there- 
fore, the  conquest  of  matter  by  intelligence 
— its   genuine   spiritualization.     It   is   not 


212        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

merely  that  natural  processes  are  subjected 
to  a  new  kind  of  determination,  however; 
that  certain  forces  which  were  determined 
before  by  antecedent  conditions  are  now 
determined  by  subsequent  events,  by  re- 
sults, that  is,  which  now  they  are  bound 
to  produce.  That  kind  of  teleology  is  al- 
ready present  in  nature,  inasmuch  as  every 
event  is  not  merely  the  effect  of  a  cause, 
but  determined  itself  to  produce  an  effect. 
No,  in  the  machine  the  action  of  natural 
forces  is  also  determined  by  their  inherent, 
but  as  yet  unrealized,  potencies  of  render- 
ing intelligent  service.  The  invention  of 
machinery  is  a  contribution  to  universal 
progress  because  by  it  the  material  uni- 
verse is  made  to  display  capabilities  hither- 
to unknown,  of  furthering  the  development 
of  self-conscious  personality. 

The  co-operation  of  thought  with  action 
in  extending  the  control  of  man  over  the 
forces  of  his  natural  environment  has  pro- 
duced results  extremely  advantageous  to 
thought  itself,  and  stimulating  to  its  devel- 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  213 

opment.  For,  among  other  achievements, 
modern  invention  has  devised  appUances 
for  experiment  and  investigation  which  have 
led  to  an  enormous  increase  in  man's  intel- 
lectual power.  Modern  invention  has  given 
to  science  the  laboratory  with  its  marvellous 
apparatus  for  discovering  the  hidden  se- 
crets of  nature.  Laboratory  instruments 
and  procedure  make  possible  the  exhaustive 
analysis  and  precise  measurement  of  nat- 
ural forces.  They  are  enabling  scientists  to 
reduce  all  changes  in  the  physical  universe 
to  terms  of  motion,  and  to  measure  the  di- 
rection and  velocity  of  this  motion.  This 
translation  of  the  natural  world,  with  its 
multitude  of  objects  varying  in  interest 
and  significance  into  mechanical  terms,  fills 
many  minds  with  apprehension  and  dismay. 
It  seems  to  them  to  mean  the  eUmination 
of  all  value  and  freedom  from  our  human 
world  and  its  replacement  by  matter  and 
mechanism,  the  veritable  shackling  of  man 
in  the  iron  chains  of  physical  necessity. 
But  the  true  idealist  whose  first  concern  is 


214        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

the  real  spiritual  progress  of  humanity  has 
no  cause  for  alarm  or  regret;  rather  should 
he  welcome  the  advance  of  exact  physical 
science.  For  the  reduction  of  all  natural 
change  to  terms  of  motion  means  that  all 
physical  processes  can  be  formulated  in 
mathematical  terms,  their  fundamental  laws 
and  relations  made  out — can,  in  fact,  be 
calculated  and  controlled.  Modern  physi- 
cal science  is  thus  preparing  the  way  for 
the  complete  conquest  of  matter  by  rational 
will.  The  progress  of  laboratory  science 
proves,  if  you  will,  that  nature,  as  it  now 
exists,  is  not  spiritual — ^but  who  that  es- 
teems spiritual  values  would  wish  to  admit 
that  it  is!  But  it  does  give  us  reason  to 
hope  that  the  natural  world  may  by  effort 
and  contrivance  be  spiritualized — and  this 
is  all  that  the  true  ideahst  could  desire. 

Modern  civilization  seeks  to  attain  its 
end  through  the  instrumentality  of  both 
thought  and  action.  These  two  capacities 
become,  therefore,  fully  spiritualized,  for 
they  are  both  made  means  to  the  develop- 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  215 

ment  of  a  universal  personal  life.  It  is  true 
that  supernaturalism  conceived  of  thought 
as  an  agency  for  realizing  an  Absolute 
Good:  the  exercise  of  reason  was  believed  to 
reveal  to  man  the  Absolute  Truth  and  to 
show  him  his  place  in  Universal  Reality. 
But  this  truth  was  conceived  abstractly, 
and  the  reality  which  it  revealed  was  one 
divorced  from  the  facts  of  human  experience. 
The  exercise  of  reason  has  not  been  neg- 
lected by  the  modern  spirit;  devotion  to  pure 
science  has  been  a  leading  characteristic  of 
modern  civiUzation.  But  modern  thought 
has  sought  to  discover  the  facts  of  the 
actual  world,  and  in  this  undertaking  it  has 
met  with  astonishing  success.  Its  ultimate 
aim  is  Absolute  Truth,  to  be  sure;  a  com- 
pleted system  of  ideas  which  shall  represent 
every  real  object.  The  facts  of  the  exist- 
ing world  do  not  permit  of  such  representa- 
tion, however,  until  they  have  been  brought 
actually  within  the  scope  of  personal  life, 
and  to  accomplish  this  is  the  task  of  action. 
And  it  is  man's  power  of  action,  however. 


216       FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

that  has  undergone  the  most  remarkable 
expansion  in  modern  times.  This  capacity 
was  neglected  and  despised  by  supernatu- 
ralism,  as  we  have  seen.  In  the  still  lower 
stage,  when  man  was  interested  altogether 
in  obtaining  and  enjoying  natural  goods,  it 
was  Umited  to  the  employment  of  a  few 
natural  forces  and  the  fashioning  of  rela- 
tively simple  tools.  Hence  the  tendency 
still  exists  to  disparage  this  faculty  as  of 
solely  utiUtarian  value,  and  as  having  no 
place  in  true  personal  development.  But 
to  take  this  view  is  to  blind  oneself  to  the 
most  notable  achievement  of  modern  times. 
For  the  modem  world  has  seen  technical  ac- 
tivity raised  to  the  level  of  personal  achieve- 
ment by  being  given  a  universal  scope  and 
significance.  The  aim  of  modern  invention 
in  both  the  mechanical  and  the  social  fields 
is  to  make  such  adjustments  and  adapta- 
tions of  existing  materials  and  forces  as 
shall  turn  them  into  means  of  universal 
human  development.  Such  are  railways 
and  steamships,  which  make  possible  whole- 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  217 

sale  transportation;  telegraph  and  tele- 
phone, which  facilitate  general  communica- 
tion; such  are  postal  service,  pubUc  school 
system,  labor  unions,  state  insurance,  etc. 
— all  permanent  instruments  of  human  bet- 
terment. Thus  the  man  who  invents  a 
new  coupling  device,  a  new  serum,  an  im- 
proved method  of  street-cleaning,  realizes 
not  a  material  but  a  spiritual  good;  for 
through  his  action  his  will  is  identified  with 
the  universal  social  Ufe.  Feeling,  whose 
contribution  to  human  progress  is  often 
forgotten,  has  also  become  in  modern  times 
an  agency  of  universal  progress.  The 
yearning  of  the  human  will  for  an  absolute 
and  eternal  good  was  a  potent  influence  in 
leading  men  to  abandon  all  natural  inter- 
ests in  order  to  seek  a  supernatural  good. 
The  feehng  which  inspires  the  modern  ser- 
vant of  humanity  is  no  less  noble,  if  less 
ecstatic.  Its  scope  is,  in  fact,  more  truly 
universal,  because  more  genuinely  compre- 
hensive; it  is  a  broad  and  fundamental  sym- 
pathy  with   humanity   universally,   a   su- 


218        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

preme  enthusiasm  for  human  development, 
and  a  profound  interest  in  every  action 
which  promises  to  further  this  end. 

Returning  now  to  the  end  sought  by  the 
moral  will  which  is  moving  in  modern  civ- 
ilization, we  have  found  ample  reason  for 
regarding  it  as  spiritual.  It  is  spiritual  be- 
cause it  represents  the  complete  satisfaction 
of  the  human  will  in  the  greatest  possible 
expansion  of  man's  personaUty.  This  life 
is  universal  because  it  comprehends,  in  the 
sense  of  making  room  for,  the  personal 
development  of  every  human  individual. 
This  ideal  of  modem  humanitarianism  was, 
of  course,  foreshadowed  by  the  Stoic  con- 
ception of  a  perfect  society  and  the  mediae- 
val ideal  of  a  spiritual  kingdom.  But  these 
former  ideals  are  static — the  perfect  society, 
the  spiritual  community  which  they  en- 
visaged was  one  already  realized  by  the 
will  of  God,  and  elevated  in  its  eternal  per- 
fection far  above  the  confused  and  frag- 
mentary existence  of  earth.  The  modern 
ideal  is,  on  the  contrary,  dynamic^  is  that 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  219 

of  an  expanding  spiritual  system,  a  develop- 
ing society  of  free  persons.  It  exists  not 
realized,  but  to  be  realized.  It  is  the  ob- 
ject not  of  contemplation  but  of  action;  it 
promises  not  the  peace  of  fulfilment  but 
the  sword  of  adventure  and  achievement. 
Thus  the  modern  moral  ideal  has  received 
concrete  embodiment  in  the  aims  of  De^ 
mocracy — ^aims  which  begin,  with  much  hesi- 
tation and  after  many  discouragements,  to 
be  reaHzed. 

The  aim  of  democracy  is  to  give  equal 
opportunities  for  self-expression  and  satis- 
faction to  all  its  citizens.  It  seeks  to  estab- 
lish a  social  life  which  shall  furnish  to  every 
individual  who  participates  in  it  full  scope 
for  personal  development;  the  individual  in 
rendering  his  service  to  society  gains  com- 
plete self-reahzation.  This  means  that  the 
will  of  each  individual  shall  achieve  the 
maximum  of  expansion  in  the  three  fields 
of  its  exercise — ^thought,  action,  and  feel- 
ing. All  citizens  will  therefore  share  in  the 
attainment  of  the  supreme  personal  good 


220        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

in  its  threefold  expression,  as  Truth  and 
Power  and  Beauty.  These  ends  are  by 
nature  universal;  they  can  be  attained  only 
in  a  community  of  intelligence;  they  imply 
the  associated  activity  of  a  community  of 
free  persons.  The  ideal  of  democracy  is 
thus  that  of  a  "perfect  society."  But  this 
ideal  can  be  realized  only  under  the  actual 
conditions  of  human  existence;  it  is  the 
great  achievement  of  the  modern  spirit 
to  have  recognized  this  fundamental  fact. 
The  forces  of  nature  must  be  so  controlled 
and  employed  as  to  furnish  all  individuals 
with  the  means  of  health  and  comfort;  the 
varied  and  conflicting  interests  of  individ- 
uals must  be  so  adjusted  as  to  make  due 
place  for  the  legitimate  activity  of  each 
one.  Now,  democracy  will  not  permit  the 
burden  of  this,  the  work  of  the  world,  to 
fall  upon  the  shoulders  of  one  class  of  its 
citizens,  in  order  that  another  shall  be 
given  leisure  and  freedom  for  higher  per- 
sonal development.  Such  an  arrangement 
would  violate  its  fundamental  principle  of 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  221 

universal  and  equal  opportunity.  No,  de- 
mocracy, on  the  contrary,  insists  that  the 
weight  of  the  world's  work  shall  be  borne 
by  all.  Its  only  recourse,  therefore,  if  it  is 
to  realize  its  ideal  under  conditions  of  earth, 
is  so  to  organize  the  work  of  economic  pro- 
duction and  social  adjustment  that  it  may 
yield  to  all  participants  the  absolute  moral 
values  above  mentioned.  Truth  and  Power 
and  Beauty,  expressions  of  that  universal 
hfe  for  which  his  will  yearns,  must  be  dis- 
covered and  attained  by  man  in  the  course 
of  his  every-day  occupations,  in  sowing  and 
reaping,  in  building  and  carrying,  in  buying 
and  selling,  in  teaching  and  heaUng.  This 
task,  which  the  hard  facts  of  existence  im- 
pose upon  the  will  of  man,  modern  civiliza- 
tion beheves  to  be  possible  of  attainment. 
Our  democratic  societies  give  evidence  that 
it  is  at  least  possible  to  realize  the  ideal  by 
idealizing  the  actual.  A  wide  dissemination 
of  knowledge  made  possible  by  popular  ed- 
ucation and  free  discussion  is  found  to  facili- 
tate industry  and  government,  besides  being 


222        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

a  permanent  means  of  self-expression  with 
citizens;  a  large  increase  of  power  over 
forces  both  physical  and  social,  due  to  the 
co-operative  use  of  machinery,  has  resulted 
in  a  great  improvement  of  man's  living 
conditions,  besides  giving  to  his  activity 
that  added  range  and  scope  which  it  ever 
craves;  a  great  extension  of  sympathy,  due 
to  mutual  understanding  and  co-operation, 
has  made  men  more  helpful  as  fellow 
laborers  and  more  agreeable  as  fellow  citi- 
zens, besides  opening  inexhaustible  sources 
of  satisfaction  in  the  appreciation  of  beauty 
in  nature  and  in  character.  The  three  su- 
preme ideals,  as  they  are  concretely  realized 
in  a  democratic  society,  appear  as  mutual 
understanding,  co-operation,  and  sympathy. 
Mutual  understanding  is  the  very  corner- 
stone of  democracy.  It  is  possible  to  found 
a  stable  society  which  shall  subserve  moral 
ends  because  expressing  the  general  will 
only  when  there  is  general  enlightenment 
and  understanding.  Knowledge,  to  be  mor- 
ally eflFective,  to  promote  personal  develop- 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  223 

ment  universally,  cannot  remain  the  exclu- 
sive possession  of  a  few;  it  must  become  the 
common  property  of  all.  Hence,  while  the 
scientific  expert  must  be  employed  by  a 
democratic  society,  he  will  be  compelled  to 
explain  his  methods  and  justify  his  results 
to  his  fellow  citizens.  The  only  way  in 
which  a  man  with  special  knowledge  can 
gain  exceptional  influence  is  by  persuading 
the  public  of  the  truth  of  his  views,  or  at 
least  of  his  competence  to  decide.  Free 
discussion  and  popular  education  are  the 
life's  breath  of  democracy.  Modern  intelli- 
gence and  technical  skill  have  been  amaz- 
ingly successful  in  the  contrivance  of  meth- 
ods and  the  invention  of  machinery  for  the 
dissemination  of  knowledge.  The  exten- 
sion of  the  franchise,  safe  only  where  there 
is  an  equal  extension  of  knowledge,  is  itself 
a  notable  educational  measure;  for  it  gives 
to  the  ignorant  an  occasion  and  incentive 
for  the  acquisition  of  information,  and  im- 
pels those  who  know  to  enlighten  their  less 
inteUigent  fellows.     PoUtical  campaigns  and 


224        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

elections,  awakening  general  interest  in 
large  national  questions  and  leading  to 
public  discussions  and  debates,  are  effective 
agencies  for  the  spread  of  ideas  and  the  in- 
crease of  understanding.  The  public-school 
system  is  the  mainstay  of  popular  govern- 
ment, insuring  that  benefits  gained  by  so- 
ciety in  the  present  shall  be  conserved  and 
enlarged  by  future  generations.  Public  li- 
braries, with  their  stores  of  books  and  peri- 
odicals for  general  use,  the  modern  news- 
paper, with  its  marvellous  facilities  for  the 
gathering  and  publication  of  news,  assist  in 
this  work  of  enlightenment.  Railways  and 
steamboats,  making  travel  speedy  and  com- 
fortable, enable  people  to  meet,  converse, 
and  keep  in  personal  touch  with  one  an- 
other. Improved  postal  service,  the  tele- 
graph, and  the  telephone  are  additional  in- 
struments of  communication  which  aid  in 
the  great  work  of  promoting  general  knowl- 
edge and  mutual  understanding.  Merely 
an  enumeration  of  methods  and  agencies  is 
suflBcient  to  show  one  how  vast  and  how 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  225 

successful  is  the  work  of  education  and  en- 
lightenment carried  on  by  a  modern  demo- 
cratic society.  And  the  result  attained — 
general  knowledge  of  the  facts  of  Ufe  and 
the  world,  with  an  understanding  of  the 
points  of  view  of  other  men — is  a  perma- 
nent means  of  self -development  and  satis- 
faction. 

Co-operation  is  the  second  feature  neces- 
sary to  the  life  of  a  democratic  society,  but 
possessed,  also,  of  supreme  moral  worth. 
It  is  plain  that  the  work  of  modern  democ- 
racy in  the  economic  and  social  fields  can  be 
carried  on  only  through  the  co-operative 
eflFort  of  its  citizens.  It  is  also  apparent 
that  co-operation  of  hand  if  not  of  soul  does 
prevail  in  modern  industry  and  govern- 
ment. To  the  division  of  labor  which  gave 
to  diflFerent  individuals  different  occupations 
there  has  been  added,  through  the  introduc- 
tion of  machinery,  a  differentiation  of  func- 
tion much  more  minute  and  thoroughgo- 
ing, organizing  workers  into  groups  within 
groups,  and  giving  to  the  individual  the 


226        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

most  definite  and  specialized  of  tasks.  The 
work  of  government  in  a  great  democracy 
has  also  become  so  immensely  enlarged  and 
exceedingly  intricate  as  to  be  saved  from 
confusion  only  by  an  elaborate  organization 
which  involves  at  once  highest  specialization 
and  completest  interdependence.  Modern 
society  has  secured  at  least  the  semblance 
of  co-operation  in  its  industrial  and  political 
organization,  but  it  is  to  be  feared  that  the 
co-operation  is  in  most  cases  a  matter  of 
outward  form  and  does  not  touch  the  inner 
soul  and  spirit.  The  division  of  labor  re- 
quired by  the  use  of  machinery  along  with 
modem  factory  methods  too  often  merely 
condemns  the  individual  to  the  monotonous 
repetition  of  an  utterly  insignificant  task, 
without  producing  in  him  any  realizing 
sense  of  the  power  and  efficiency  of  the 
whole  enterprise  to  which  he  contributes. 
It  is  one  of  the  pressing  duties  of  democracy 
to  remedy  this  condition,  and  so  to  reorgan- 
ize its  industries  and  enterprises  that  their 
working  shall  yield  this  fundamental  moral 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  227 

value.  This  end  will  not  be  gained  by  the 
abandonment  of  machinery  and  the  meth- 
ods of  manufacture  and  transportation  to 
which  its  employment  have  led.  On  the 
contrary,  it  is  in  the  invention  of  more 
machinery  and  the  further  extension  of  its 
use  that  the  hope  of  reaching  an  ultimate 
solution  of  the  problem  chiefly  lies.  For 
we  may  hope  that  in  time  all  the  dangerous 
and  deadening  tasks  may  be  given  over  to 
machinery;  no  class  of  unfortunates  will  be 
compelled  by  circumstances  to  perform 
them.  The  work  of  men,  in  the  sphere 
of  industry  and  commerce  at  least,  will 
consist  almost  entirely  in  the  control  of 
machinery,  and  this  work  they  must  do 
together.  With  the  conditions  of  labor  im- 
proved and  the  mode  of  living  bettered,  it 
remains  to  produce  among  the  workers  the 
spirit  of  co-operation.  A  movement  in  this 
direction  seems  to  be  developing  out  of  the 
recent  efiiciency  propaganda.  For  it  is 
seen  with  increasing  clearness  that  efficiency 
cannot  be  secured  by  attention  to  physical 


228        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

factors  alone,  by  the  elimination  of  all  waste 
of  power  and  material.  The  human  factor 
must  also  be  considered — ^the  personality  of 
the  workers  must  be  taken  into  account. 
Each  individual  must  be  given  the  task 
most  congenial  to  his  taste  and  fitted  to 
his  abihty;  then  he  must  be  encouraged  to 
make  the  most  of  its  possibilities.  But 
most  of  all,  industries  must  be  so  managed 
as  to  enlist  the  interest  and  arouse  the  loy- 
alty of  the  workers.  They  must  come  to 
feel  a  sense  of  personal  ownership  in  the 
machinery,  to  be  thrilled  by  its  power,  to 
take  satisfaction  in  its  productions.  To 
this  consciousness  they  have  a  moral  right, 
because  the  machinery  is  an  invention  of 
human  intelligence,  an  achievement  of  the 
rational  will  which  is  striving  in  all  men. 
When  the  individual  thus  identifies  the  in- 
dustry or  enterprise  with  his  own  will  his 
fellow  workers  become  his  partners,  united 
not  by  their  common  antagonism  to  those 
who  "own"  or  direct  the  enterprise,  but  by 
their  common  interest  in  and  devotion  to  it. 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  229 

In  this  way  the  life  of  the  individual  be- 
comes truly  universaHzed;  his  powers  of 
action  receive  their  rightful  satisfaction 
through  participating  in  the  successful  effort 
of  man's  intelligence  to  control  the  condi- 
tions of  his  existence. 

Besides  general  enlightenment  and  recip- 
rocal service,  a  whole-hearted  sympathy 
among  fellow  citizens  is  implied  in  the  very 
existence  of  democracy.  With  the  devel- 
opment of  a  democratic  society  this  fellow- 
feeling  broadens  and  deepens,  and  it  is  mani- 
festly to  the  interest  of  such  society  to 
encourage  and  foster  this  growth  imtil  it  be- 
comes the  genuine  emotion  of  brotherhood. 
There  is  no  more  effective  method  of  pro- 
moting the  concord  of  feeling  among  all 
sorts  and  conditions  of  men  than  by  ena- 
bHng  them  to  enjoy  together  the  same  beau- 
ties in  works  of  nature  and  of  art.  For  a 
distinguishing  feature  of  the  feeling  of 
aesthetic  appreciation  is  its  disinterested- 
ness. The  sense  of  beauty  is  awakened  by 
harmonies  and  proportions  in  objects  that 


230        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

appeal  to  the  perceptive  and  imaginative 
faculties  of  men  in  an  identical  or  similar 
manner.  Thus  by  the  establishment  of 
parks  and  art-galleries,  through  the  mainte- 
nance of  playgrounds  and  the  encourage- 
ment of  architecture,  through  wise  city 
planning  and  the  preservation  of  rural 
scenery,  we  provide  permanent  sources  of 
emotional  concord  among  the  members  of 
society.  And,  associated  thus  in  the  same 
experience  of  aesthetic  enjoyment,  individ- 
uals are  drawn  together,  are  led  to  consider 
and  admire  characteristics  perceived  in  one 
another.  This  appreciation  of  nobilities  of 
character  which  is  the  basis  of  true  love,  is 
itself  fostered  by  some  of  the  arts,  notably 
poetry  and  music.  In  verse  and  song  the 
noble  qualities  and  splendid  achievements  of 
national  heroes  are  celebrated,  and  a  multi- 
tude of  individuals  are  made  one  by  the 
responsive  thrill  which  such  poetry  and 
music  awaken.  Thus  the  development  of 
civic  consciousness  and  corporate  feeling 
among  fellow  citizens  leads  to  the  realization 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  ^31 

by  the  human  will  of  Beauty  and  Love,  ends 
of  universal  scope  and  capable  of  affording 
abiding  satisfaction. 

The  moral  will  of  modern  man  is  seeking 
and,  we  find,  is  beginning  to  attain,  an  end 
which  is  genuinely  universal.  Genuinely, 
because  concretely,  universal  in  the  sense  of 
being  all-comprehensive,  a  social  life  which 
provides  for  the  possible  personal  develop- 
ment of  all  individuals  in  a  completely  civ- 
ilized world.  This  undertaking  of  the  mod- 
ern spirit  depends,  as  we  have  seen,  upon 
faith — ^faith  that  existing  facts  and  forces 
can  all  of  them  be  adapted  to  the  fulfilment 
of  man's  personal  needs.  Such  faith,  we 
must  also  acknowledge,  has  been  in  a  large 
measure  justified  by  the  achievements  to 
which  it  has  led,  by  the  amazing  success  of 
modern  man  in  readjusting  natural  forces 
and  reorganizing  social  institutions,  with  a 
view  to  his  own  larger  personal  satisfaction. 
Modern  technical  science  has  come  to  think 
of  the  natural  universe  not  as  a  dead-weight 
of  inert  matter  driven  by  equally  blind 


232        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

forces  through  endlessly  repeated  cycles  of 
monotonous  change,  but  as  a  great  store- 
house of  unknown  potencies,  itself  progres- 
sive, and  containing  limitless  possibilities  of 
further  growth  under  the  impulsion  and  con- 
trol of  intelligence.  May  we  not,  then, 
suppose  that  man  has  come  within  sight  of 
the  goal  of  his  own  progress?  Is  not  the 
roadway  at  last  cleared  and  open  for  the 
rapid  advance  of  human  vohtion  to  its  own 
final  and  complete  satisfaction?  Have  we 
not  found  the  long-sought  solution  of  the 
problems  of  human  life  and  human  destiny 
which  have  vexed  man's  spirit  from  the  be- 
ginning of  his  career,  in  the  modern  pro- 
gramme of  social  progress  through  the  bet- 
terment of  human  living  conditions,  both 
economic  and  social  ? 

Before  assenting  to  this  optimistic  view 
which  is  widely  current  in  these  days  of 
evolutionary  science,  we  must  stop  to  con- 
sider certain  facts  that  loom  large  and  cast 
deep  shadows  in  the  path  of  modern  prog- 
ress.   In  the  first  place,  we  must  admit  that 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  288 

modern  man's  control  over  nature  is  pur- 
chased at  a  staggering  cost.  The  wonderful 
discoveries  and  inventions,  the  gigantic  en- 
terprises and  vast  undertakings  of  modern 
civilization  have  resulted  in  an  incalculable 
amount  of  suffering  and  a  countless  number 
of  premature  deaths  among  human  indi- 
viduals. That  such  inventions  and  enter- 
prises prevent  suffering  and  loss  of  Ufe — ^in 
most  cases  far  more  than  they  cause — is 
freely  admitted.  But  neither  can  it  be 
denied  that  they  have  brought  with  them 
new  perils,  new  possibihties  of  disaster. 
The  steamship,  the  steam  railway,  electric 
traction  and  illumination,  the  automobile, 
agencies  of  civilization  and  means  of  human 
betterment  that  they  are,  contribute  each 
one  of  them  to  the  growing  number  of  acci- 
dental injuries  and  deaths  that  occur,  par- 
ticularly in  our  crowded  centres  of  popula- 
tion. And  when  we  turn  to  such  enterprises 
as  modern  mining  and  bridge-building  and 
tunnelling,  the  toll  of  life  and  limb  paid  by 
the  workers  is  appalling.     Of  course  it  is 


234       FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

reasonable  to  hope  that  in  the  future  the 
dangers  and  disasters  which  follow  upon 
the  employment  of  mechanical  instruments 
may  be  lessened  by  further  inventions. 
But  suppose — which  seems  unlikely — that, 
by  ingenuity,  man  is  able  to  eliminate  en- 
tirely the  accidents  which  follow  upon  the 
employment  of  machinery  by  human  soci- 
ety. This  risk  of  injury  and  death  must 
still  be  run  by  the  inventor,  the  discoverer, 
the  explorer,  through  whose  intelligence  and 
inventive  skill  society  acquires  the  means  of 
betterment.  One  who  elicits  hitherto  un- 
known potencies  of  nature  by  chancing  new 
combinations  of  her  forces  must  frequently 
be  prepared  to  stake  his  life  in  the  venture. 
The  discovery  of  a  new  serum  costs  the  life 
of  a  devoted  investigator;  knowledge  of  a 
new  explosive  is  purchased  at  the  expense  of 
a  dozen  killed  and  injured.  The  loss  of  the 
Titanic  reminded  civilized  society  that  every 
step  forward  in  the  conquest  of  the  sea  is 
purchased  at  a  considerable  expense  of  hu- 
man life;  the  same  is  true  of  modern  railway 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  235 

travel;  the  cost  of  conquering  the  air  prom- 
ises to  be  greatest  of  all.  A  colossal  enter- 
prise Uke  the  Panama  Canal  puts  a  prema- 
ture end  to  hundreds  if  not  to  thousands  of 
human  careers;  railways  built  to  open  rich 
tropical  forests  are  flanked  by  the  graves  of 
the  men  who  labored  to  construct  them;  we 
accept  it  as  a  matter  of  course  that  a  great 
bridge  or  aqueduct  or  tunnel  should  take  a 
life  or  two.  Such  penalty  man  has  to  pay 
for  his  success  in  harnessing  the  forces  of 
nature  to  the  chariot  of  his  progress;  it  is 
inconceivable  that  in  the  future  he  should 
be  able  to  continue  his  conquests  except 
at  a  similar  cost.  Imagine,  however,  what 
seems  to  be  impossible;  that  he  should  de- 
vise means  of  continuing  his  transformation 
of  nature  in  perfect  safety  to  himself.  It  is 
impossible  to  imagine  him  by  any  skill  or 
invention  doing  away  with  physical  death, 
and  thus  gaining  for  himself  permanence  of 
life.  And  as  long  as  death  remains  there  is 
conflict  and  antagonism  between  the  natural 
conditions  of  man's  existence  and  his  per- 


FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

sonal  needs — the  conflict  and  antagonism  in 
which  physical  evil  is  rooted.  The  death  of 
an  individual  may  evidently  be  for  the  bene- 
fit of  humanity;  such  is  the  case  with  many 
individuals  whose  very  death  is  a  part  of 
their  service  to  humanity^ — ^the  heroes,  the 
patriots,  the  martyrs  of  all  ages.  The  death 
of  all  individuals  may  even  be  shown  to  be 
in  a  certain  sense  favorable  to  the  progress 
of  the  race,  since  it  makes  life  while  it  lasts 
more  intense,  more  significant.  But  these 
considerations  do  not  solve  the  problem  for 
the  individual.  His  will  demands  a  Ufe 
which  shall  be  universal  in  its  scope,  per- 
manent in  its  achievement. 

When  we  look  from  the  physical  to  the 
social  sphere  we  find  a  similar  situation. 
That  modern  civilization  is  making  progress 
with  the  work  of  reorganizing  society  in 
order  to  provide  place  for  the  different  in- 
dividuahties  that  may  claim  a  part  in  its 
life,  is  undeniable.  But  that  this  progress 
is  made  at  the  cost  of  arousing  new  enmities 
and  oppositions,  and  without  any  certain 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  237 

prospect  of  bringing  about  a  complete  rec- 
onciliation of  interests,  is  also  apparent. 
Modern  social  reform  seeks  so  to  recon- 
struct institutions  and  revise  laws  as  to 
enforce  the  equal  rights  and  the  common 
interest  of  all  individuals.  Its  aim  is  an 
adjustment  so  thoroughgoing  that  each  in- 
dividual may  find  in  serving  society  a  ful- 
filment of  his  own  ambition.  But  in  many 
cases  the  measures  which  are  successful  in 
correcting  grave  injustice  are  themselves 
productive  of  new  conflict  and  discord. 
Our  present  economic  system  of  free  con- 
tract and  free  competition  among  individ- 
uals was  effective  in  maintaining  the  rights 
of  individuahty  as  against  the  injustice  of 
feudalism,  but,  as  we  all  know,  it  has  been 
productive  of  ruthless  greed  and  unscrupu- 
lous rapacity.  Free  speech  and  a  free  press 
were  valuable  instruments  in  freeing  the 
individual  citizen  from  the  oppression  of 
the  tyrant  and  in  developing  a  pubUc  opin- 
ion which  is  favorable  to  the  recognition  of 
many  larger  social  interests — but  they  have 


238        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

given  an  unparalleled  power  to  demagogues 
and  demagoguery.  The  social  innovator  or 
reformer,  like  the  inventor  in  the  mechani- 
cal realm,  must  be  willing  to  take  his  life  in 
his  hands.  For  he,  through  his  experiments 
and  reconstructions,  runs  the  risk,  if  not  of 
physical  death,  at  least  of  loss  of  reputation 
and  property  and  peace  of  mind.  For  hu- 
man beings  are  uncertain  quantities,  social 
influences  are  elusive  and  incalculable,  and 
one  who  attempts  to  establish  new  relations 
or  make  new  adjustments  is  liable  to  reach 
unexpected  and  disconcerting  results.  If 
his  attempt  is  successful  he  is  given  an  hon- 
ored place  among  the  leaders  of  society;  if 
unsuccessful,  his  own  natural  regret  over 
his  failure  and  wasted  effort  is  made  more 
bitter  by  the  reproaches  and  ridicule  of  his 
fellows.  Finally,  experience  gives  us  no 
reason  to  expect  that  by  a  social  adjust- 
ment, no  matter  how  complete,  we  can  elim- 
inate the  necessity  for  self-sacrifice.  When, 
in  its  simpler  and  more  obvious  expressions, 
it  is  rendered  unnecessary  by  social  prog- 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  239 

ress,  it  reappears  in  subtler  and  more  poign- 
ant forms.  Progress,  economic  and  social, 
may  well  secure  such  a  plentiful  production 
and  equitable  distribution  of  the  means  of 
subsistence  that  no  individual  need  surren- 
der his  own  possessions  in  order  to  relieve 
the  distress  of  his  fellows.  But  the  claims 
of  individuality  will  then  assert  themselves 
in  the  higher  sphere  of  personal  achieve- 
ment. The  individual  will  be  confronted 
with  the  hard  duty  of  giving  up  his  oppor- 
tunity for  personal  culture  and  achievement 
in  order  to  perform  his  share  of  the  labor 
required  for  the  material  support  of  man- 
kind. The  problem  of  self-sacrifice,  the 
conflict  of  egoism  and  altruism,  appears  in 
the  most  acute  and  difficult  form  when  the 
individual  is  obliged  to  give  up  not  material 
possessions — ^for  such  surrender  is  frequently 
a  blessing  in  disguise — but  all  opportunity 
for  personal  development  and  self-realiza- 
tion in  order  to  support  and  care  for  others. 
In  such  cases  the  conditions  of  human  exis- 
tence seem  to  compel  the  individual  to  con- 


240        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

sent  to  his  own  personal  degradation  in 
order  to  save  and  succor  his  needy  fellows. 
Such  conflicts  between  the  claims  of  indi- 
vidual culture  and  social  service  promise  to 
be  the  bitterest  struggles  of  our  future  mo- 
rahty;  for  democratic  society  provides  for 
the  support  of  no  special  class  privileged  to 
enjoy  the  fruits  of  personal  culture,  but  in- 
spires in  the  heart  of  every  individual  the 
yearning  for  the  larger  personal  develop- 
ment. Self-sacrifice  cannot  be  removed 
from  human  hfe,  therefore;  because  it  is 
rooted  in  the  private  and  exclusive  char- 
acter of  individuaUty,  and  thus  cannot  be 
destroyed  without  destroying  human  nature 
itself. 

Finally,  we  have  to  admit  that  the  exten- 
sion of  human  interests  to  cover  the  entire 
world,  which  is  a  distinguishing  mark  of 
modem  civilization,  has  made  possible  evils 
of  whose  magnitude  men  have  had  until 
now  only  a  dim  foreboding,  but  which  we 
in  these  years  can  realize  in  their  dread 
actuaUty.     The  modern  will,  when  true  to 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  241 

its  professed  universality,  seeks  world  bet- 
terment. Hence,  when  citizens  of  a  mod- 
ern state  devote  themselves  to  national  wel- 
fare, it  should  be  with  the  understanding 
that  the  nation  which  they  serve  is  a  mem- 
ber of  the  family  of  nations,  with  a  service 
to  render  to  the  international  community. 
But  world  influence  which  is  thus  the  right- 
ful privilege  of  a  nation,  is  easily  confounded 
with  a  world  power  which  is  gained  at  the 
expense  of  other  nations  and  maintained  to 
their  detriment.  Thus  the  way  is  opened 
to  a  rivalry  among  nations  for  world  power 
and  a  struggle  to  obtain  the  coveted  mas- 
tery by  diplomatic  strategy  and  force  of 
arms.  And  when  nations,  carried  away  by 
this  ambition  for  world  power,  press  into 
service  all  the  discoveries  of  modern  science 
and  the  products  of  modem  invention  to 
improve  the  enginery  of  war,  and  utilize  all 
the  costly  triumphs  of  the  modern  mind  in 
terrestrial,  naval,  and  aerial  locomotion  for 
purposes  of  military  expedition  and  attack, 
the  result  is  slaughter  so  stupendous,  de- 


242        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

struction  so  colossal,  as  to  exceed  our  powers 
of  comprehension.  The  European  war  of 
1914  has  shown  not  merely  that  evil  of  gi- 
gantic proportions  persists  in  modern  so- 
ciety; it  has  also  proved  that  there  are  forces 
still  lurking  in  human  nature  which  will, 
unless  controlled,  annihilate  the  whole  fab- 
ric of  modern  civilization. 

It  turns  out  that  democracy,  the  perfectly 
organized  society  of  free  persons,  is  a  task 
and  not  a  triumph  of  the  modern  will. 
Evil,  that  fatal  presence,  has  not  been  over- 
come and  eliminated  from  modern  life;  man 
has  taken  only  the  first  few  steps  in  its  con- 
quest, and  is  consequently  able  to  count 
the  cost  of  completing  the  enterprise.  The 
great  undertakings  of  the  modern  spirit, 
control  of  the  forces  of  nature  and  adjust- 
ment of  individualities  in  society,  can  be 
advanced  only  through  the  sacrifices  of  indi- 
viduals. This  tragic  fact  that  the  universal 
ideal  which  the  moral  will  of  man  now  pro- 
poses to  realize,  demands  constant  and  real 
sacrifices  from  human  individuals,  is  fre- 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  243 

quently  overlooked  by  optimistic  melio- 
rists.  Man  can  subdue  nature  to  his  uses 
only  through  the  sacrifice  of  his  own  com- 
fort and  safety;  he  can  secure  co-operation  in 
society  only  through  the  sacrifice  of  his  in- 
terests and  private  ambitions.  The  one 
part  of  his  task  involves  peril  and  hardship, 
the  other  discipline  and  denial,  and  both 
entail  struggle  and  suffering.  Now  such 
sacrifices  are  not  easily  made,  nor  should 
they  be  lightly  dismissed.  The  natural  will 
which  strives  to  provide  man  with  comfort 
and  enjoyment  during  his  physical  lifetime, 
stoutly  opposes  such  sacrifice.  Moreover, 
this  natural  will  revives  and  reasserts  itself 
with  renewed  strength  in  modern  times. 
For  the  modern  spirit,  which  has  sought  to 
realize  a  "universal"  end  through  a  read- 
justment of  actual  conditions,  has  succeeded 
measurably  well  in  attaining  the  "natural" 
good  which  man  strove  in  vain  to  secure 
by  depending  directly  upon  the  sequences 
of  nature.  Hence  intelligent  individuals 
whose  situation  is  at  all  favorable  may  be 


244        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

tolerably  certain  to-day  of  a  life  of  profit- 
able and  pleasant  activity  and  an  old  age 
of  security  and  ease.  Modern  science  and 
invention  have  multiplied  a  thousandfold 
the  conveniences,  the  comforts,  the  safe- 
guards of  man's  natural  existence.  Nat- 
uralism has  thus  taken  fresh  hold;  it  threat- 
ens to  become  the  controlling  influence  in 
human  life.  The  influence  of  such  modern 
naturalism,  of  course,  runs  squarely  counter 
to  the  devotion  to  a  universal  ideal  which 
demands  sacrifice  of  natural  interest  and 
individual  ambition.  Its  prudential,  calcu- 
lating spirit  once  uppermost  makes  alto- 
gether impossible  that  willingness  to  sacri- 
fice self  required  for  pursuit  of  the  universal 
good.  If  further  progress  is  to  be  made, 
therefore,  in  attaining  the  end  of  universal 
human  development,  man  must  have  the 
courage  to  resist  the  call  of  natural  plea- 
sures and  to  persevere  in  the  path  of  strug- 
gle and  of  sacrifice. 

One  thing,  and  one  thing  only,  can  give  to 
the  modern  man  courage  to  make  the  sac- 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  US 

rifices  required  in  the  realization  of  the  uni- 
versal hfe.  That  is  faith — ^belief  in  the 
essential  permanence,  the  fundamental  real- 
ity, of  personality.  The  personaUty  which 
is  here  beUeved  in  is  personality  in  its  uni- 
versal aspect,  that  personality  which  em- 
braces and  includes  the  lives  of  others  in 
intimate  and  organic  union.  If  such  uni- 
versal personaUty  and  not  the  narrower  and 
more  restricted  character  of  the  individual 
or  the  group  is  the  real  thing,  then  the  man 
who  furthers  its  development  through  the 
use  of  physical  forces  or  of  social  agencies 
increases  his  own  reahty.  He  does  so  even 
if  his  work  in  the  mechanical  and  social 
fields  is  done  at  the  sacrifice  of  his  own  indi- 
vidual comfort  or  health  or  ambition  or 
existence  itself.  Through  his  very  sacrifice 
he  will,  under  such  assumption,  identify 
himself  most  effectually  with  universal  real- 
ity; he  will  raise  himself  to  a  higher  plane  of 
existence,  he  will  thereby  participate  in  the 
universal  life  for  which  his  soul  yearns. 
But  how  can  such  faith  be  gained  or,  rather, 


246        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

regained  after  it  has  been  lost  in  a  grilling 
and  benumbing  warfare  with  refractory  and 
unyielding  conditions,  both  physical  and 
social?  Where  else  than  from  religion — 
man's  never-faiUng  resource  when  faith 
wavers  and  ideals  lose  their  power?  The 
human  will  can  attain  its  ultimate  end  of  a 
universal  personal  life  only  through  persis- 
tent struggle  and  continued  sacrifice.  The 
courage  required  for  such  struggle  and  sac- 
rifice comes  only  from  faith,  faith  in  the 
all-conquering  power  of  personal  will.  Such 
faith  is  produced  and  sustained  only  by 
religion.  The  conclusion  to  which  we  are 
led,  nay  driven,  is  that  the  moral  will  of 
man  can  realize  the  universal  good  to  which 
it  aspires  only  if  it  is  assisted  and  inspired 
by  rehgious  beUef . 

Let  us  set  this  conclusion  clearly  before 
us.  The  modern  spirit  can  realize  its  ideal 
of  a  universal  personal  life  only  if  it  is 
strengthened  and  impelled  by  rehgious 
faith.  The  hope  of  progress,  of  democracy 
itself,  hes  in  religion.     Only  if  there  is  a 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  247 

revival  of  religious  faith  can  the  human  will 
prove  equal  to  the  high  task  it  has  under- 
taken. But  the  need  is  not  for  any  religion 
whatsoever;  not  every  religion  would  fulfil 
the  requirements  of  the  situation.  No,  in 
the  present  crisis  of  modern  civilization,  the 
supreme  need  is  for  a  religion  which  shall 
give  power  and  reality  to  the  ideal  of  uni- 
versal personal  development  and  justify 
any  sacrifices,  no  matter  how  great,  made 
in  its  behalf.  Is  such  a  religion  to  be  found  ? 
Fortunately  for  human  progress,  such  a 
religion  has  been  in  existence  for  twenty 
centuries,  awaiting  the  time  when  man 
should  awake  to  an  appreciation  of  its  sig- 
nificance and  avail  himself  of  its  power. 
The  fundamental  principles  of  Christianity, 
misconceived  and  misapplied  as  they  have 
been,  yet  in  spite  of  their  misinterpreta- 
tions proving  the  most  potent  influences 
that  have  ever  worked  for  human  better- 
ment, constitute  a  religion  such  as  we  seek. 
At  the  heart  of  the  teachings  of  Jesus  is  a 
revelation  of  the  character  and  will  of  God. 


248        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

In  the  Christian  gospels  God  is  revealed  not 
as  a  being  whose  holiness  raises  him  far 
above  the  human  world  and  whose  will  is 
chiefly  absorbed  in  increasing  his  own  glory. 
This  is  the  God  of  mediaeval  asceticism,  not 
of  Christianity.  The  teachings  of  the  New 
Testament  reveal  to  us  a  God  who  is  ac- 
tively engaged  in  the  work  of  universal  bet- 
terment. He  is  indeed  the  leader  of  the 
forces  of  righteousness  and,  Uke  all  true 
leaders,  he  shares  the  struggles  and  priva- 
tions of  the  enterprise.  He  strives  in  the 
cause  of  universal  progress,  himself  bearing 
the  heaviest  burden  of  toil  and  responsibil- 
ity. His  omnipotence  is  not  conceived  ab- 
stractly as  the  absence  of  every  limitation 
in  case  of  every  power,  an  omnipotence 
which  would  make  it  impossible  for  him 
really  to  want,  to  desire,  to  seek  after  an 
object,  because  such  purpose  and  pursuit 
would  indicate  a  lack  and  an  incomplete- 
ness in  himself.  Rather  is  his  omnipotence 
shown  positively  and  concretely  in  his 
moral  perfection.     And  this  moral  perfec- 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  249 

tion  does  not  consist  in  a  passionless  purity, 
an  exalted  holiness.  On  the  contrary,  God's 
moral  perfection  finds  expression  according 
to  the  truly  Christian  view,  in  the  personal 
quality  to  which  we  human  beings  attach 
highest  moral  value,  benevolence — in  benev- 
olence, developed  to  the  highest  degree. 
Now  benevolence,  as  we  know  it,  is  always 
directed  upon  persons  and  reaches  its  full- 
est development,  its  supreme  manifesta- 
tion, in  suflFering  and  sacrifice,  for  its  per- 
sonal object.  In  harmony  with  what  is 
deepest  and  most  profound  in  our  moral 
experience,  therefore,  Christianity  repre- 
sents the  benevolence  of  God  as  expressing 
itseK  in  suffering  and  self-sacrifice  for  cher- 
ished creatures.  It  is  the  unique  merit  of 
Christianity  that  it  dares  to  attribute  these 
most  searching  and  significant  human  ex- 
periences of  suffering  and  sacrifice  to  God 
himself.  God  is  revealed  as  a  Father  who 
loves  his  human  children  with  the  only  per- 
fect love. 

Here,  then,  is  the  religious  faith  needed 


250        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

to  nerve  man  for  the  tremendous  under- 
taking of  modern  civilization.  This  noble 
mission  it  can  fulfil  because  it  is  of  such 
character  as  first  to  arouse  men  to  vigorous, 
persistent  effort  in  the  realization  of  univer- 
sal ideals,  and,  second,  to  give  them  the 
hope  and  confidence  which  they  must  have 
if  they  are  to  undergo  without  discourage- 
ment or  despair  the  pain  and  privation 
which  this  effort  must  cost  them.  Let  us 
then  consider  a  little  further  these  two  ser- 
vices which  true  religion  promises  to  render 
man  at  this  critical  point  in  his  moral  devel- 
opment. 

Belief  in  a  God  who  is  striving  to  realize 
all  the  possibilities  for  good  in  the  universe 
is  bound  to  inspire  man  with  a  zealous  de- 
termination to  do  what  he  can  to  advance 
the  cause  of  universal  progress.  "My 
Father  worketh  even  until  now,  and  I 
work,"  said  Jesus,  and  man  is  encouraged 
by  this  conception  of  God  to  become  a  fel- 
low-worker in  the  great  task  of  evolution. 
If  we  wish  to  appreciate  the  superior  mo- 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  251 

live  power  of  such  a  religion,  we  have  only 
to  compare  it  with  the  types  of  religious  be- 
lief dominant  in  the  earlier  stages  of  human 
progress.  The  God  of  the  natural  man,  the 
God  of  power  and  of  justice,  had  plans  of 
His  own  to  carry  out  which  did  not  con- 
cern man,  except  to  require  his  obedience 
in  certain  specific  points.  Man  had  also 
plans  of  his  own  to  reahze,  and  he  had  no 
interest  in  the  purposes  of  Deity  beyond 
rendering  the  specified  services  required  to 
escape  punishment  and  gain  reward.  Hence 
no  real  co-operation  between  man  and  God 
was  possible;  only  a  kind  of  compromise  or 
working  agreement  in  which  each  made  a 
certain  allowance  for  the  interest  of  the 
other.  Neither  has  the  God  of  supernat- 
uralism  any  possible  need  for  assistance 
from  man;  He  is  engaged  in  no  real  under- 
taking. All  that  He  purposes  is  already 
completely  and  finally  realized  in  the  per- 
fection of  his  nature.  Such  a  religion  fur- 
nishes man  with  no  incentive  to  spend  him- 
self in  the  work  of  world  betterment.     No 


252        FAITfi  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

reason  exists,  in  fact,  why  he  should  exert 
himself  or  show  any  particular  zeal  in  im- 
proving worldly  conditions.  Every  event 
in  universal  history  is  already  foreordained, 
every  emergency  is  provided  for,  down  to 
the  last  detail;  if  evil  seems  to  triumph  or 
failure  to  threaten  the  divine  plan,  the  dan- 
ger is  only  apparent,  and  its  appearance  is 
due  to  our  human  short-sightedness.  In 
such  circumstances  man  is  surely  justified  in 
turning  his  attention  away  from  the  earthly 
scene  and  in  losing  himself  in  visions  of 
spiritual  perfection.  In  complete  contrast 
to  these  views  stands  the  Christian  concep- 
tion which  represents  God  as  really  working 
for  that  ideal  of  a  universal  life  which  the 
human  will  yearns  to  realize.  Such  belief 
imparts  an  added  worth  to  that  ideal  of 
complete  personal  development  which  man 
in  rare  moments  of  spiritual  vision  has  pro- 
jected; it  stamps  the  loftiest  aim  of  modern 
civilization  with  the  seal  of  divine  authority 
and  approval.  Moreover,  the  belief  that 
even  God  is  striving  and  battling  to  over- 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  253 

come  adverse  conditions  implies  the  further 
beUef  that  the  unfinished  task  offers  vast 
opportunities  to  men  of  doing  real  work,  of 
performing  real  service.  Men  may  expect 
by  their  efforts  to  make  real  contributions 
to  universal  progress,  and  since  personal 
capacities  differ,  each  individual  may  hope 
to  accomplish  results  which  no  one  else 
could  achieve.  To  each  human  individual, 
therefore,  the  high  privilege  is  given  of  be- 
coming a  fellow-worker  with  God,  and  of 
accomplishing  a  work  which  but  for  his 
effort  must  remain  forever  undone.  Surely 
no  nobler  opportunity  for  service  could  be 
offered  to  man ! 

Besides  kindling  in  the  human  heart  a 
zeal  to  contribute  something  to  universal 
progress,  the  Christian  conception  of  God,  if 
believed  in  with  the  whole  heart,  produces 
in  the  mind  of  man  a  serene  confidence  in 
his  own  personal  destiny  which  enables  him 
to  undergo  without  flinching  repeated  suf- 
fering and  painful  death,  if  encountered  in 
the  path  of  duty.     Such  religious  faith  re- 


254        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

vives  man's  faith  in  the  permanence  of  his 
personality,  in  the  indestructibihty  of  the 
selfhood  which  he  has  by  the  exercise  of 
his  own  will  built  up.  Belief  in  personal 
immortality  has  been  waning  in  the  modern 
world,  owing  to  man's  increasing  knowledge 
of  the  vastness  of  the  physical  universe  and 
the  might  of  its  forces  in  comparison  with 
which  his  own  strength  is  so  slight,  his  own 
efforts  so  feeble,  his  own  life  so  evanescent, 
as  to  appear  altogether  negligible.  This 
growing  disbelief  in  immortality  is  one  of 
the  most  ominous  signs  of  the  times;  it 
means  that  the  human  will  is  losing  confi- 
dence in  its  own  powers.  But  without  con- 
fidence in  itself  human  voUtion  is  bound  to 
prove  entirely  unequal  to  the  task  which 
confronts  it.  Let  volition  lose  faith  in  its 
own  ability  to  enlarge  still  further  the  scope 
of  personal  life  and  all  hope  of  further  prog- 
ress is  gone.  The  descent  to  naturalism 
and  even  to  animalism  will  be  precipitous 
and  final.  It  is  absolutely  necessary,  there- 
fore, that  man  preserve  unshaken  his  belief 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  255 

in  the  permanence  of  personality,  in  the 
inconquerable  potency  of  his  own  rational 
will.  Such  a  reUgion  as  that  founded  on 
the  Christian  revelation  of  God  seems  to 
be  the  only  one  that  will  meet  the  present 
need.  The  immortality  which  it  promises 
is  not  one  projected  into  another  world  nor 
postponed  to  a  future  life.  It  is  a  hfe  which 
the  human  will  achieves  in  the  present 
world  through  its  efforts  and  its  struggles  to 
convert  existing  conditions  into  means  of 
universal  good.  If  the  God  of  the  Christian 
gospels  is  supremely  real,  then  reality  is 
measured  not  in  physical  but  in  moral  terms, 
not  according  to  amount  of  physical  energy 
but  according  to  degree  of  moral  excellence. 
Now  the  moral  excellence  to  which  supreme 
reality  is  attributed  has  its  source  in  the 
expansive  power  of  personality.  This  ex- 
pansive power,  identical,  of  course,  with 
personal  will,  involves  as  a  necessary  fea- 
ture in  its  working,  suflFering  and  self-sacri- 
fice; for  new  objects  can  be  sought  only  at 
the  cost  of  abandoning  old  satisfactions. 


256        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

new  fields  of  activity  can  be  discovered 
only  by  breaking  down  the  barriers  which 
have  secured  and  protected  hard-won 
sources  of  certain  satisfaction.  Suppose 
that  God  himself  is  not  exempt  from  the 
suffering  and  self-sacrifice  essential  to  per- 
sonal development;  suppose  that  he,  as  the 
guiding  spirit  in  the  work  of  universal  prog- 
ress, makes  the  greatest  sacrifices,  suffers 
the  most  intense  pain.  Then  the  man  who 
endures  suffering,  who  sacrifices  his  most 
cherished  interests  in  his  efforts  to  reahze 
the  Universal  Ideal,  does  not  have  his 
reahty  lessened  or  destroyed  thereby,  even 
if  his  suffering  diminish  the  amount  of  his 
physical  strength  or  cut  short  the  term  of 
his  natural  existence.  Rather  does  he  in- 
crease his  personal  reality,  since  his  very 
suffering  and  sacrifice  gain  him  entrance 
to  the  fuller  and  more  comprehensive  life 
lived  by  God;  his  very  pain  and  privation 
admit  him  into  fellowship  with  God,  into 
permanent  union  with  the  Supreme  Reality. 
The  efforts  of  the  human  will  to  extend 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  257 

the  range  of  its  activity  have,  as  we  have 
seen,  been  continually  frustrated  by  unfa- 
vorable conditions.  In  this,  of  course,  con- 
sists evil — in  the  conflict  of  individual  inter- 
ests and  of  human  welfare  with  the  natural 
order.  The  result  of  this  maladjustment  is 
that  the  good  of  the  whole  can  be  attained 
only  by  the  sacrifice  of  the  parts.  For  this 
problem  of  evil  the  Christian  faith  proposes 
the  only  possible  solution,  by  maintaining 
that  the  good  of  the  parts  is  in  its  turn  se- 
cured by  the  sacrifice  of  the  whole.  In  the 
human  individual,  then,  isolated  fragment 
of  reality  as  he  may  seem  to  be,  the  Univer- 
sal Will,  the  principle  of  supreme  reality,  is 
struggling  and  striving  to  gain  expression. 
And  in  so  far  as  such  individual,  in  obedi- 
ence to  the  promptings  of  the  larger  will 
within  him,  sacrifices  his  narrower  actual 
interest  to  the  universal  good,  to  just  that 
degree  is  he  claiming  his  birthright  and 
winning  permanent  reality.  Intelligence 
and  will  first  appear  in  organic  evolution  as 
functions  of  the  individual  organism;  their 


258        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

office  is  to  aid  in  adjusting  this  organism  to 
the  conditions  of  its  environment  and  thus 
of  prolonging  its  existence.  But  in  man 
will  has  so  far  developed  as  to  turn  the 
tables  on  nature,  and  to  utilize  the  living 
organism  as  an  instrument  by  which  to 
transform  existing  conditions,  physical  and 
social,  so  as  to  enlarge  the  scope  of  personal 
life.  Suppose,  now,  that  the  will  of  a 
human  individual  succeeds  in  achieving 
this  service,  in  thus  contributing  something 
to  the  personal  development  of  humanity. 
Such  an  individual  will  is  no  longer  the  ser- 
vant of  a  bodily  organism,  dependent  upon 
it  for  very  existence  and  bound  to  perish 
when  it  is  dissolved  into  its  elements.  It 
has  freed  itself  from  bondage  to  the  flesh;  it 
has  claimed  its  birthright  of  permanent 
reality;  it  has  realized  its  potential  univer- 
sality. It  has,  in  fact,  become  an  expres- 
sion of  the  Universal  Will,  manifesting  itself 
through  the  multitude  of  individuals,  and  is 
destined  to  participate  in  the  realization  of 
the  universal  good. 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  259 

Thus  we  reach  our  final  conception  of 
human  progress.  We  see  it  as  the  work  of 
volition,  the  effort  of  Universal  Will  to  ex- 
pand the  sphere  of  its  activity  by  availing 
itself  of  all  the  opportunities  for  further  ex- 
pression offered  by  the  nature  of  things. 
But  actual  conditions  prove  refractory  and 
unyielding.  Volition  is  frequently  checked 
and  frustrated  in  its  endeavor  to  bring  them 
under  control;  it  is  confronted  by  the  prob- 
lem of  natural  evil.  In  overcoming  these 
difficulties  universal  volition  gains  great 
advantage  by  dividing  itself  into  a  vast 
number  of  individual  wills.  Each  of  these 
individuals  is  able  to  concentrate  its  effort 
upon  the  exploitation  of  that  particular 
one  out  of  the  many  possibilities  of  nature 
with  which  it  is  in  a  position  most  effectively 
to  deal.  The  achievements  of  individuals 
in  the  mastery  of  natural  conditions  are 
made  permanent  possessions  of  the  Univer- 
sal Will  through  communication  and  co- 
operation. But  the  individuals  frequently 
prove  obstinate  and  self-centred.     They  re- 


260        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

fuse  to  make  the  results  they  have  gained 
means  to  enlarging  the  scope  of  others'  ac- 
tivity; they  prefer  a  transient  independence 
of  action  to  a  permanent  participation  in 
the  universal  achievement.  The  very  con- 
ditions of  individuation  thus  constitute  an- 
other source  of  evil;  the  problem  of  moral 
evil  is  added  to  that  of  natural.  This  diffi- 
culty can  be  met  only  by  imparting  to  indi- 
viduals added  personal  power  from  the 
Universal  Source,  in  order  that  the  intrinsic 
universaHty  belonging  to  all  volition  may 
serve  to  counteract  the  exclusive  tendency 
of  individuahty.  If  this  effect  is  not  se- 
cured, the  result  of  making  individuals 
more  powerful  will  of  necessity  be  to  make 
them  more  potent  and  mischievous  in  their 
independence.  Thus  universal  progress  is 
essentially  a  venture;  as  an  enterprise  of 
will  its  outcome  is  uncertain  and  fraught 
with  possibiUties  of  disaster  and  failure. 
But  much  ground  has  already  been  gained. 
VoUtion  is  constantly  annexing  new  terri- 
tory and  thus  enlarging  the  theatre  of  its 


THE  UNIVERSAL  LIFE  261 

activity;  it  is  successfully  liberating  itself 
from  hampering  conditions  that  circum- 
scribe its  activity,  thus  enlarging  the  scope 
of  the  free  personal  Ufe  for  which  in  ful- 
ness it  yearns.  We  are  justified  in  hoping, 
therefore,  that  the  will  which  is  striving  in 
universal  evolution  will  not  fail  in  its  en- 
deavor; that  universal  progress  will  not 
come  short  of  its  goal.  We  have  found 
reason  to  believe,  moreover,  that  the  course 
of  progress  is  not  hke  the  passing  of  a  torch 
onward  from  one  generation  to  the  next, 
each  generation  falling  into  oblivion  when 
its  task  is  done,  but  rather  like  a  rising  tide, 
a  tide  of  personal  life  constantly  being  aug- 
mented by  the  contributions  of  individuals 
who,  having  had  a  share  in  its  labors,  have 
won  a  right  to  participate  in  the  satisfac- 
tion of  final  fulfilment,  of  complete  self- 
realization. 


'^ 


POSTSCRIPT 

THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

Even  the  briefest  survey  of  the  stages  in 
social  evolution  is  sufficient  to  demonstrate 
the  importance  of  religion  as  a  factor  in 
human  progress.  To  us  religious  belief  has 
appeared  as  a  product  of  human  volition. 
Man's  gods  have  been  constructions  of  his 
imaginative  intelligence,  given  objectivity 
by  an  effort  of  his  own  will.  Religion  has 
not  been  a  mere  by-product  of  social  evolu- 
tion, however;  it  ranks  as  a  genuine  achieve- 
ment of  the  human  will  and  plays  an  essen- 
tial part  in  its  progressive  realization.  It 
renews  man's  confidence  in  the  power  of  his 
own  will  after  repeated  failures,  and  gives 
him  hope  and  courage  for  a  new  venture. 
It  serves  as  a  defense  for  ground  already 
gained  in  the  expansion  of  human  personal- 
ity and  points  the  way  to  new  conquests 
possible  in  the  realm  of  spirit.     Nor  should 

262 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  263 

the  fact  that  the  objects  of  religious  belief 
are  projections  of  the  human  will  lead  us  to 
think  that  they  altogether  lack  the  reaUty 
possessed  by  other  objects.  Our  study  has 
shown  us  that  the  natural  universe,  with  its 
multitude  of  existing  things  and  many  in- 
teracting forces,  is  likewise  a  construction 
of  man's  intelligent  volition;  is  similarly  a 
matter  of  faith  with  him.  Religious  belief 
gains  reality,  just  as  all  other  beliefs  do, 
through  a  process  of  verification.  Such 
verification  comes  in  the  results  of  action. 
If  a  belief,  when  acted  upon,  enlarges  the 
scope  of  personal  life  and  opens  to  the  agent 
a  more  varied  field  for  further  activity,  it  is 
to  that  extent  realized.  For  any  course  of 
action  is  itself  a  question  put  to  Reality, 
and  such  a  result  as  just  suggested  is  a  sign 
that  Reality  gives  its  sanction  to  the  belief 
which  prompted  it.  This  is  the  test  to 
which  religion  has  constantly  been  sub- 
jected in  the  course  of  human  progress,  and 
no  one  can  deny  that  it  has  stood  the  test 
successfully. 


264        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

But  there  are  degrees  of  completeness 
and  of  finality  in  verification.  Thus  a  be- 
Hef  may  stand  verified  because  when  acted 
upon  it  increases  the  control  of  conscious 
personality  over  the  conditions  of  its  activ- 
ity, and  later  have  to  give  way  to  another 
and  different  belief  about  the  same  object, 
which  when  put  in  practice  still  further  in- 
creases the  range  of  man's  personal  activity. 
In  such  cases  the  first  belief  possesses  in 
comparison  with  the  second  only  a  provi- 
sional truth,  a  temporary  vahdity.  Now  it 
must  be  confessed  that  religious  belief  has 
in  stage  after  stage  of  human  progress 
played  this  part  of  provisional  truth,  has 
time  after  time  appeared  as  a  temporary 
expedient,  extremely  valuable,  absolutely 
necessary,  in  fact,  to  tide  the  human  will 
over  difficult  places  in  its  road  of  progress, 
but  destined  in  every  instance  to  give  place 
to  other  and  contrary  beliefs  about  the  na- 
ture of  the  world  and  the  behavior  of  its 
forces.  Thus  the  savage,  when  the  fruit 
upon  which  he  depends  for  his  food-supply 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  265 

fails  to  ripen,  may  make  sacrifices  to  the 
4eity  which  presides  over  vegetation,  in  the 
hope  that  he  may  supply  other  fruit  of 
bush  or  tree.  The  belief  which  prompts 
him  thus  to  act  steadies  and  strengthens  his 
will,  while  he  searches  the  wood  for  other 
food;  thus  it  is  verified.  But  when  man's 
advancing  intelligence  enables  him  to  under- 
take systematic  agriculture,  his  behef  in  the 
efiicacy  of  natural  causes  to  produce  the 
desired  results  supersedes  this  primitive 
religious  faith.  The  work  of  religion  is  not 
done,  however;  for  upon  a  higher  level  we 
find  it  springing  up  anew.  When  unusual 
drouth  interrupts  the  expected  course  of 
growth  and  fruition,  man  prays  to  God  to 
send  the  needed  rain,  relying  upon  his 
promises  to  aid  those  human  beings  who 
obey  and  serve  him.  This  more  developed 
religion  is  in  its  turn  superseded;  man  no 
longer  prays  for  rain  when,  through  the  ex- 
ercise of  inventive  skill,  guided  by  the  con- 
clusions of  exact  science,  he  is  able  to  de- 
vise improved  methods  of  agriculture  which 


266        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

produce  good  crops  in  spite  of  deficient 
rainfall.  Such  facts  as  these,  patent  to  the 
student  of  human  progress,  lead  one  inevi- 
tably to  ask  if  religious  belief  is  not  essen- 
tially provisional  in  character,  and  if  its 
object,  the  divine,  is  more  than  a  vague 
adumbration  or  at  best  an  imaginary  sym- 
bol of  natural  processes  as  yet  undiscovered 
but  nevertheless  requisite  for  the  realiza- 
tion of  man's  will  and  the  completion  of  his 
world  ? 

This  question  comes  home  to  us  most 
sharply  when  we  ask  it  concerning  our  relig- 
ion of  the  present  day,  for  it  seems  safe  to 
suppose  that  the  religious  beliefs  of  modern 
civilized  society  represent  religion  in  the 
fullest  development  to  which  it  has  yet 
attained.  Must  we  believe  that  our  own 
religion  at  its  best  is  only  an  expression  of 
our  ignorance  of  forces  which  we  neverthe- 
less recognize  as  influencing  human  des- 
tiny, along  with  the  determination  to  dis- 
cover and  utilize  these  forces?  When  we 
thus  make  the  question  one  of  the  truth  of 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  267 

present  forms  of  religion,  we  are  compelled 
to  recognize  the  existence  in  civilized  so- 
ciety of  variant  tendencies  in  religious 
belief.  Most  prominent,  perhaps,  are  two 
types  which  we  may  call  prudential  and 
mystical.  Prudential  religion  relies  upon 
God,  as  a  being  of  power  and  purpose,  to 
provide  man  with  the  material  goods  of 
earthly  existence.  Mystical  religion  ap- 
peals to  God,  as  a  being  of  transcendent 
purity  and  holiness,  to  free  man  from  the 
limitations  of  earthly  existence,  and  to  ele- 
vate him  to  the  sphere  of  abiding  spiritual 
reality.  These  are,  of  course,  the  forms  of 
religion  previously  described  as  character- 
istic of  the  "natural"  and  "supernatural" 
hfe,  respectively.  It  will  assist  us  in  un- 
derstanding the  present  religious  situation 
if  we  review  the  leading  characteristics  of 
these  two  forms  of  religion. 

Prudential  religion  springs  from  man's 
desire  to  provide  for  his  own  comfort  and 
security  during  the  period  of  his  natural 
existence.     This    he    attempts    to    do    by 


268        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

utilizing  the  resources  of  his  physical  en- 
vironment. He  takes  heed  of  the  more  ob- 
vious processes  of  nature — the  course  of  the 
seasons,  the  germination,  growth,  and  frui- 
tion of  plants,  the  nutrition  and  reproduc- 
tion of  animals,  planting  and  gathering  his 
crops,  pasturing  and  breeding  his  flocks 
and  herds.  He  becomes  famihar  with  the 
more  accessible  materials — wood,  stone,  and 
iron — making  tools  and  building  himself 
houses  and  barns.  But  these  natural  forces 
and  agencies  prove  untrustworthy;  through 
their  uncertain  and  incalculable  action  his 
plans  are  set  at  naught,  his  prospects 
ruined,  his  health  and  very  existence  are 
placed  in  jeopardy.  The  drouth  destroys 
his  crops,  the  pestilence  kills  his  herd,  fire 
and  storm  devastate  his  dwellings.  In  this 
emergency  he  has  recourse  to  religion  to 
renew  his  confidence  in  his  own  ability  to 
insure  future  well-being  in  the  presence  of 
an  uncertain  and  sometimes  hostile  environ- 
ment. The  Deity  in  whom  he  believes  is 
not  the  "mysterious  power"  of  the  savage. 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  269 

however;  He  is  endowed  with  personaUty 
and  possessed  of  definite  purposes  which  He 
is  interested  in  reaKzing.  With  such  a  God 
it  is  possible  to  bargain  or,  if  the  term  be 
preferred,  to  covenant.  The  man  who 
obeys  His  will,  acknowledging  His  sover- 
eignty, and  worshipping  Him  according  to 
the  prescribed  ritual,  He  will  protect  from 
accident  and  calamity,  will  preserve  in 
health  and  prosperity.  For,  besides  being 
powerful,  God  is  just — ^just  in  the  sense  of 
paying  what  is  due  in  the  way  of  reward  or 
penalty.  The  reward  of  those  who  obey 
the  divine  commands  is  at  first  supposed  to 
come  within  the  hmits  of  earthly  existence. 
But  experience  proving  that  fortune  does 
not  discriminate  between  behevers  and  un- 
believers in  this  present  world,  the  divine 
judgment  with  its  ensuing  rewards  and  pen- 
alties is  postponed  to  a  future  life.  But  the 
relation  maintained  between  God  and  man 
is  the  same  in  both  cases. 

Mystical    religion    springs    from    man's 
yearning  after  a  spiritual  good,  for  the  cul- 


270        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

tivation  of  his  own  soul  through  the  knowl- 
edge of  absolute  truth  and  this  perception 
of  ideal  beauty.  To  such  spiritual  ends  we 
find  him  turning  when,  through  repeated 
failure,  he  is  led  finally  to  despair  of  obtain- 
ing any  certain  natural  good.  In  contrast 
to  wealth  and  reputation  and  pleasure, 
which  are  at  the  mercy  of  a  fickle  fortune, 
these  spiritual  goods  appear  to  depend 
solely  upon  the  choice  and  inspiration  of 
the  human  will.  Thus  man  comes  to  place 
over  against  the  natural  world,  which  he 
repudiates  as  worthless  and  disappointing, 
a  supernatural  realm,  which  he  regards  as 
his  eternal  home.  But  it  is  difficult  for  him 
to  maintain  his  faith  in  the  supreme  reality 
of  such  a  supernatiu'al  realm.  The  natural 
world  presses  in  upon  him;  hunger  and 
cold,  sickness  and  death  constantly  ob- 
trude themselves  upon  his  attention.  To 
strengthen  his  faith  in  the  supernatural 
good  to  which  he  has  devoted  himself,  he 
again  has  recourse  to  religion.  God  is  this 
time  so  conceived  as  to  impart  superior  and 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  271 

abiding  reality  to  the  supernatural  world 
and  the  spiritual  life.  He  is  characterized 
by  his  personal  purity,  which  raises  him  out 
of  any  contaminating  contact  with  the  nat- 
ural world  and  its  many  evils.  To  power 
and  justice  are  now  added  holiness  as  his 
distinguishing  attribute.  Such  a  God  can 
enter  into  relation  with  the  world  of  human 
affairs  only  through  mediators  who  bridge 
the  abysmal  guK  between  the  natural  and 
the  supernatural.  Through  the  assistance 
of  such  mediators,  however,  man  may  re- 
turn to  God;  he  may  at  once  begin  the  life 
of  supernatural  reaUty,  of  spiritual  bliss. 
Naturally,  individuals  thus  saved  from  the 
world  will  desire  during  the  rest  of  their 
earthly  existence  to  withdraw  from  human 
society  in  order  that,  undistracted  by 
worldly  afiFairs,  they  may  taste  the  joys  of 
the  heavenly  vision. 

Turning  now  from  the  past  to  the  present, 
we  see  both  these  types  of  religion  existing 
in  our  civiUzed  societies.  Much  of  what 
passes  for  Christian  faith  is  either  pruden- 


272        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

tial  or  mystical  in  character,  or  a  mixture 
of  both.  But  the  student  of  social  and 
moral  evolution  is  bound  to  conclude  that 
these  two  types  of  religion  have  lost  their 
value  for  civilized  man  and,  consequently, 
are  doomed  to  disappear  from  modern  so- 
ciety. This  is  not  because  the  needs  which 
evoked  them  have  disappeared;  man  labors 
no  less  arduously  to  provide  for  his  own 
future  security  and  comfort;  he  seeks  no 
less  earnestly  the  higher  spiritual  goods. 
But  he  has  found  other  and  more  effective 
means  of  satisfying  these  needs  than  those 
furnished  by  prudential  and  mystical  reUg- 
ion.  Modern  man  secures  his  own  natural 
existence  and  well-being,  not  by  bargaining 
for  divine  protection  against  natural  ills, 
but  by  gaining  mastery  over  natural  forces 
through  his  own  experimental  science,  in- 
ventive skill,  and  technical  proficiency.  He 
does  not  rely  upon  divine  providence  to 
protect  him  from  shipwreck  at  sea;  he 
makes  a  compass,  constructs  a  steamship, 
invents  the  wireless  telegraph.     He  does  not 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  273 

expect  to  avert  drouth  by  prayer;  through 
scientific  research  and  experiment  he  so  im- 
proves his  methods  of  agriculture  that  a 
decided  diminution  of  the  rainfall  does  not 
ruin  his  crops.  He  does  not  attempt  to 
check  epidemic  by  reHgious  sacrifices  and 
processions;  he  discovers  the  cause  of  dis- 
ease, learns  how  to  destroy  maHgnant  germs 
or  prevent  their  communication.  With  re- 
gard, secondly,  to  the  spiritual  goods  whose 
acquisition  mystical  religion  pretends  to  in- 
sure, modern  man  has  learned  that  these 
are  attained  not  by  individuals  who  with- 
draw from  worldly  pursuits  and  devote 
themselves  to  supernatural  concerns,  but  by 
those  who  avail  themselves  most  success- 
fully of  the  spiritual  resources  of  their  fel- 
low-men, as  these  are  developed  through 
personal  association  and  co-operation. 
Hence  modem  society  aims  so  to  organize 
its  activities  that  the  insights,  the  inven- 
tions, and  the  appreciations  of  all  can  be 
appropriated  by  each  one  and  made  con- 
tributory to  his  personal  development.    To 


274        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

this  end  it  establishes  popular  education  and 
promotes  free  discussion,  it  encourages  re- 
search and  rewards  invention,  it  fosters  art 
and  stimulates  wholesome  play. 

It  is  evident  that  these  two  undertakings, 
the  control  of  nature  through  the  applica- 
tion of  science  to  industry  and  the  develop- 
ment of  man's  personal  powers  through  the 
organized  activities  of  society,  are  the  pur- 
poses of  democracy.  In  fact,  taken  to- 
gether, they  constitute  the  programme  of  de- 
mocracy. For  democracy  is  more  than  the 
abstract  ideal  of  equality.  It  is  the  ideal  of 
a  society  which  provides  for  the  free  per- 
sonal development  of  all  its  members.  But 
it  is  also  a  method.  Material  necessities 
and  comforts  it  proposes  to  produce  and 
distribute  through  the  co-operative  industry 
of  its  citizens;  no  privileged  class  is  to  be 
permitted  to  live  in  idleness,  supported  by 
the  labor  of  the  remainder.  And  it  pro- 
poses to  find  means  of  spiritual  culture  in 
this  very  co-operative  industry.  For  no 
class  is  to  be  exempted  from  toil  and  given 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  275 

leisure  for  thought  and  enjoyment;  hence,  if 
spiritual  values  are  to  be  realized,  they  must 
be  found  in  the  performance  of  the  common 
task.  But  this  turns  out  to  be  their  true 
source,  since  industry  can  become  genuinely 
co-operative  only  on  the  basis  of  mutual  un- 
derstanding, mutual  helpfulness,  mutual 
sympathy,  and  out  of  these  arise  knowledge 
and  power  and  love  of  beauty,  the  choicest 
gifts  of  the  spirit.  Democracy  is  thus  the 
modem  method  of  fulfilling  those  needs 
which  prudential  and  mystical  religion  arose 
to  satisfy.  No  wonder  that  democracy  has 
appealed  to  many  minds  as  a  substitute 
for  religion  or,  perhaps  better,  as  itself  a 
reUgion !  That  it  is  a  substitute  for  pruden- 
tial and  mystical  religion,  thus  supplanting 
them  both,  seems  indubitable.  If  religion 
can  have  no  function  beyond  ministering  to 
man's  need  for  natural  security  and  spiritual 
culture,  its  work  appears  to  be  already  done 
and  its  eventual  disappearance  inevitable. 
Or,  to  put  the  matter  differently,  unless  new 
needs  arise,  which  no  existing  agency,  nat- 


276       FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

ural  or  social,  can  fulfil,  religion  has  no  fur- 
ther part  to  play  in  human  history.  Have 
such  needs  arisen?  More  definitely,  has 
democracy,  in  providing  a  method  for  the 
fulfilment  of  man's  needs,  natural  and  spir- 
itual, created  new  needs  which  only  religion 
can  satisfy?  An  attempt  to  answer  this 
question  will  bring  us  at  once  to  what  is 
truly  the  religion  of  the  present — ^the  relig- 
ion of  modern  civilized  society.  It  repre- 
sents the  highest  development  of  the  re- 
Ugious  consciousness;  it  has  already  been 
described  as  the  religion  of  the  universal  life. 
On  what  force  does  democracy  depend  for 
the  accomplishment  of  its  task  of  promoting 
the  personal  development  of  its  members? 
Clearly,  upon  the  thoroughgoing  co-opera- 
tion of  its  members,  upon  the  absolute  de- 
votion of  individuals  to  the  comprehensive 
social  good.  Such  complete  co-operation  of 
mankind  in  the  work  of  subjugating  nature 
and  cultivating  the  powers  of  personality 
can  be  obtained  only  at  the  expense  of  the 
private  interests  of  individuals.  Every 
great   enterprise   which   aims   to   increase 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  277 

man's  control  over  natural  forces  lays  its 
tax  upon  the  health,  takes  its  toll  of  the 
lives  of  the  individuals  employed;  the  con- 
struction of  a  great  canal,  railway,  bridge, 
or  tunnel,  is  expected  to  involve  many  cas- 
ualties among  the  workers.  So  also  with 
invention  and  discovery;  the  discoverer  of 
a  new  serum  pays  with  his  own  life;  those 
who  first  employ  a  new  remedy  jeopardize 
their  own  health  and  safety.  The  cost  to 
individuals  who  participate  in  the  work  of 
spiritual  enlightenment  and  progress,  if  less 
obvious,  is  none  the  less  real.  They  may 
not  risk  their  health  or  their  Hves,  but  they 
are  forced  to  give  up  private  preferences 
and  individual  ambitions  as  dear  to  them 
as  life  itself.  One  who  labors  for  the  spirit- 
ual advancement  of  humanity  cannot  allow 
his  own  taste  and  talents,  in  science  or  in 
art,  to  interfere  with  his  social  responsibil- 
ity; nay,  more,  he  must  be  prepared  to  suf- 
fer misunderstanding  and  even  opprobrium 
on  account  of  his  devotion  to  social  prog- 
ress and  reform. 
Such  devotion  of  individuals  to   social 


278        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

weKare  as  democracy  presupposes  thus  in- 
volves real  sacrifice  on  their  part — the  en- 
durance of  pain,  privation,  and  even  death 
itself,  in  the  service  of  society.  Is  it  reason- 
able to  expect  from  human  individuals  a 
willingness  thus  to  devote  themselves  to  a 
social  ideal,  the  capacity  for  sacrificing  their 
private  interests  to  its  service?  On  one 
condition  only — ^that  the  mass  of  men  are 
convinced  that  the  larger  social  life,  the  Hfe 
of  human  personality  in  its  universal  aspect, 
is  more  permanent,  more  potent,  more  real 
than  the  existence  of  the  natural  individual 
or  his  private  interest.  If  such  is  the  true 
view,  then  it  is  evident  that  the  individual 
who  surrenders  his  private  interests,  spends 
his  strength,  and  shortens  his  natural  life  in 
devoted  service  of  society,  gains,  not  loses, 
in  personal  development;  since  through  his 
very  suffering  and  sacrifice  he  raises  himself 
to  a  higher  plane  of  reality,  that  of  universal 
spiritual  life.  But  this  cannot  be  proved;  it 
must  remain  a  matter  of  faith.  On  the  ex- 
istence of  this  faith  democracy  is  altogether 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  279 

dependent,  but  is  of  itself  powerless  to  pro- 
duce it.  Here,  then,  is  the  new  need 
created  by  democracy,  which  religion  can 
alone  fulfil — ^the  need  of  faith  in  the  superior 
reality  of  the  social  community,  the  com- 
munity of  persons  united  through  mutual 
understanding,  service,  and  sympathy,  over 
that  of  natural  individuaUty,  with  its  nar- 
row interests  and  exclusive  ambitions. 
Here,  too,  is  the  function  of  religion  in  a 
democracy — that  of  giving  supernatural 
sanction  or,  better,  spiritual  reality,  to 
those  social  values  which  have  become  su- 
preme in  the  course  of  human  progress. 

That  form  of  present-day  religion  which 
promises  to  dominate  the  future  is  neither 
prudential  nor  mystical,  it  is  ethical  and 
social.  What  particular  forms  it  may  take 
as  time  goes  on  cannot,  of  course,  be  pre- 
dicted. But  it  may  serve  to  make  more 
definite  the  meaning  of  social  religion  if 
we  try  to  state  the  fundamental  doctrines 
which  such  a  religion  must  proclaim  in 
order  to  discharge  its  function  of  upholding 


280       FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGKESS 

the  reality  of  social  values.     Such  a  religion 
must  teach,  it  would  appear: 

1.  An  immortality  of  the  human  person 
conditioned  by  his  devotion  to  inclusive 
social  ends  and  consequent  identification 
with  the  life  of  the  spiritual  community. 
The  future  life,  as  an  occasion  for  reward 
or  punishment,  has  ceased  to  interest  the 
modern  man  or  move  him  to  action.  No 
more  powerful  moral  dynamic  could  be 
imagined,  however,  than  that  supplied  by 
behef  in  an  immortality  which  may  be  won 
— an  immortaUty  which  offers  an  oppor- 
tunity for  further  personal  development  to 
those  individuals  who  in  their  earthly  exis- 
tence have  devoted  themselves  to  universal 
ends. 

2.  The  existence  of  a  spiritual  community 
made  up  of  those  persons  who  during  the 
period  of  their  earthly  existence  labored 
faithfully  for  the  universal  human  good,  and 
who,  after  death  has  removed  them  from 
the  earthly  scene,  constantly  inspire  men 
to  deeds  of  heroism  and  self-sacrifice  in  the 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  281 

service  of  society.  The  leaders  of  this  com- 
munity are  the  great  moral  teachers  and 
heroes  of  the  race;  prominent  in  it  are  the 
saints  and  the  sages,  the  patriots  and  the 
martyrs,  who  through  the  long  centuries 
have  striven  to  benefit  their  fellow-men; 
present,  also,  are  all  those  who  in  obscure 
and  humble  station  have  faithfully  dis- 
charged their  social  vocation. 

3.  The  immanence  and  eJEcacy  of  God 
as  the  guiding  spirit  of  social  progress,  the 
leader  in  the  work  of  human  betterment, 
who  strives  and  suffers  with  us  in  the  cause 
of  universal  evolution. 

And  now  we  come  to  the  crucial  question 
— ^the  question  that  is  ever  hovering  in  the 
mind  of  one  who  considers  the  "enlight- 
ened" reUgion  of  the  present  as  the  outcome 
of  age-long  religious  evolution.  Must  we 
suppose  that  this  final  form  of  religious  be- 
hef  is  also  but  a  temporary  expedient  des- 
tined to  disappear  at  the  time  when  a  wider 
experience  has  furnished  man  with  a  scien- 
tific knowledge  of  the  facts  of  the  social 


282       FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

consciousness,  its  true  character  and  man- 
ner of  growth?  Before  venturing  to  sug- 
gest an  answer  to  this  question  we  should 
inquire  what  sort  of  facts  would,  if  known, 
render  unnecessary  the  social  religion  of  the 
present,  and  how  such  knowledge  could  be 
acquired.  Now,  if  the  preceding  argument 
be  sound,  this  knowledge  must  be  that  of 
the  permanence  and  continued  development 
of  conscious  personality  in  its  universal 
social  aspect.  Such  knowledge  as  this  will 
be  gained  only  when  the  experience  of  those 
individuals  who  have  striven  and  suflFered 
for  inclusive  human  ends  during  their  nat- 
ural existence,  and  thereafter  continue  to 
participate  in  the  labors  and  satisfactions  of 
social  progress,  is  communicated  to  their 
brethren  whose  outlook  is  limited  to  the 
visible  world.  Is  it  probable  that  human 
science  will  devise  methods  for  receiving 
such  communications.^  Sir  Oliver  Lodge 
believes  that  he  and  his  fellow-workers  in 
the  Society  for  Psychical  Research  have  al- 
ready received  preliminary  communications 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION  283 

of  this  kind  and  that  these  communications, 
increasing  in  number  and  significance  in 
the  near  future,  promise  to  furnish  men 
with  new  sources  of  power  and  inspiration. 
The  painstaking  work  of  such  investigators 
in  a  difficult  and  suspected  field  deserves 
our  admiration,  and  their  opinions  should 
receive  respectful  attention.  As  yet  they 
have  not  convinced  many  persons  whose 
acquaintance  with  the  phenomena  under  in- 
vestigation and  with  the  conditions  of  sci- 
entific verification  generally  renders  them 
competent  judges.  The  majority  of  us  re- 
main sceptical,  probably  from  a  conviction, 
strong  if  not  expHcitly  justified,  that  such 
facts  as  these,  if  they  are  ever  made  known, 
will  not  be  communicated  through  the  chan- 
nels which  are  being  sounded  by  the  Society 
for  Psychical  Research.  But  suppose  that 
such  knowledge  should  be  acquired,  either 
in  this  manner  or  in  some  other.  Will  it 
mean  that  religion  is  finally  discredited  and 
superseded  ?  Nay,  shall  we  not  rather  say, 
confirmed  and  completed  ?    For  in  that  case 


284        FAITH  JUSTIFIED  BY  PROGRESS 

what  religion  has  for  so  long  seen  with  the 
eye  of  faith  will  at  last  have  been  empiri- 
cally made  known — that  Spirit  is  the  ulti- 
mate and  prevailing  reality. 


INDEX 


Absolute  Ideal:  j  Conceived 
supematurally,  155-156; 
as  the  aim  of  modern  civili- 
zation, 215;  as  a  demo- 
cratic society,  219  Jf. 

Action:  As  motor  adjust- 
ment of  individual,  79,  80; 
as  generalized  community 
practice,  101,  102;  pre- 
dominant in  the  natural 
life,  168;  in  modem  civili- 
zation, 206-208,  216. 

Esthetic  enjoyment,  230. 

Causality,  95. 

Christianity:  The  support  of 
supematiu*alism,  179;  the- 
ory of  salvation,  183;  phi- 
losophy of  history,  184-189; 
as  dynamic  of  modem  civi- 
lization, 247;  ethical  value 
of.  252. 

Co-operation,  225. 

Copernicus:  Founder  of  mod- 
cm  scientific  world-view, 
8;  significance  of  Coper- 
nican  astronomy,  9-11. 

Darwin:  Completes  mechan- 
ical world-view,  16;  opin- 
ion of  factors  in  evolution, 
17-18. 

Democracy:  Expressing  the 
ideal   of  modem   civiliza- 


tion, 219  Jf,;    depends  on 

mutual  understanding,  222; 

on  co-operation,   225;    on 

sympathy,  229;  religion  of, 

279. 
Desire:  Governs  the  life  of 

primitive  man,  59;  fails  of 

satisfaction,  76. 
Development:    Postulate  of, 

203. 
Division  of  labor,  226. 

Efficiency  propaganda,  228. 

End:  Chosen  end,  as  a  qual- 
ity common  to  many  ob- 
jects, 71;  as  a  system  of 
qualities  sought  by  many 
individuals,  105;  as  a  uni- 
versal spiritual  system, 
169;  as  sought  by  the 
modern  will,  218. 

Evil:  In  primitive  life,  77; 
in  natural  life,  114-119; 
in  supernatural  life,  173- 
176;  in  modem  civiliza- 
tion, 232/.;  of  war,  217, 
240;  power  to  endure,  256; 
endangering  democracy, 
228,  277. 

Evolution:  Postulate  of,  203; 
goal  of,  259. 

Faith:  Defined,  1;  in  grati- 
fication of  primitive  desire. 


285 


286 


INDEX 


64,  65;  primitive  religious, 
80;  in  provision  for  future 
need,  90-95;  natural  re- 
ligious, 119  Jf.;  in  super- 
naturalism,  163  jf.;  of 
modernism,  202;  required 
from  religion  in  modem 
civilization,  245. 
Feeling:  In  volition,  51;  in 
primitive  life,  74. 

God:  Power  of  primitive,  80, 
81;  justice  of,  121.  125; 
holiness  of,  182;  benev- 
olence of,  249;  in  social  or 
ethical  religion,  281. 

Government:  Psychological 
basis  of,  103,  104. 

Humanism:  Outcome  of  mod- 
em philosophy,  41-42; 
key  to  human  progress,  43, 
44. 

Idealism:  Plato's  145  Jf.;  rise 
of  absolute,  32;  errors  of 
absolute.  33,  34. 

Ideas,  Platonic,  145  Jf. 

Immortality,  125-127;  254. 
258,  280. 

Industrial  arts,  102. 

IndustriaHsm,  226. 

Instinct:  Source  of  action, 
61;  development  into  de- 
sire, 63. 

Invention,  208  Jf. 

Jesus:  The  founder  of  Chris- 
tianity, 179.  180;  His  rev- 
elation of  God,  248. 


Kant:  Mechanical  cosmog- 
ony, 13-15;  theory  of 
knowledge,  22-29;  trans- 
formation of  his  philosophy 
into  absolute  idealism,  32- 


Laboratory  science,  213. 
Libraries.  224. 

Machinery,  209/. 

Magic,  87. 

Middle  Ages:  Faith  of,  4,  5; 
world- view  of,  6;  pre- 
occupation with  teleology, 
189;  symbolism  of,  190. 

Modem  spirit:  Expression 
of  will,  197;  different  from 
naturalism,  198/. 

Mystical  religion,  269. 

Natural  law.  88. 

Natural  life:  Character  of, 

98;    dominated  by  action, 

108;  failure  of,  113-118. 
NaturaUstic     philosophy: 

Cause  of  decline  in  faith, 

8,  19-21. 
Neo-Platonists,  171. 
Newton,  12. 

Parks  and  play-grounds,  230. 
Philosophy:  Corrects  excesses 

of  naturalism,  21. 
Plato,  145. 

Popular  education,  224. 
Pragmatism:    Origin  of,  35; 

theory  of,  36-38;  criticism 

of,  39,  40. 
Progress:  Source  of,  57;  goal 

of,  259. 
Pmdential  religion,  267. 
Psychical  research,  282. 


INDEX 


287 


Religion:  In  primitive  life, 
79,  80;  character  of  prim- 
itive religion,  81,  82;  value 
of  primitive  religion,  83; 
in  the  natural  life  of  man, 
122;  natural  polytheism, 
119jf.;  as  the  recourse  of 
supernaturalism,  178; 
needed  in  modem  life,  244; 
truth  of,  262,  263;  finality 
of,  264;  of  the  present-day, 
266,  271;  future  of.  281/. 

Self-sacrifice:  190,  240,  243, 
249,  278. 

Social  reform,  237. 

Spiritual  life:  Conception 
of,  132;  ideal  of,  156/. 

Spiritual  world:  Nature  of, 
134,    135;     discovery    of, 

'   139-141;    constitution  of, 

^   141/. 

Stoics,  161, 170.  172. 

Substance,  postulate  of,  68.  ^ 

Supernatural  life:  Charac- 
ter of,  162;  faith  of,  163; 
failure  of,  173.  193;  virtue 
of,  190,  196. 

Sympathy.  229. 


Teleology,  postulate  of,  166; 
in  Middle  Ages,  190. 

Thought:  In  supernatural- 
ism, 187;  in  modem  civili- 
zation. 213;  in  democracy, 
222. 


War.  117.  240. 

Will:  As  source  of  human 
progress,  43,  57;  definition 
of,  45-48;  thought  in,  50; 
action  in,  52;  feeling  in. 
51;  creative  of  personality, 
55;  involves  faith,  55,  56; 
source  of  belief  in  objective 
existence,  65;  in  operation 
of  causes,  96;  in  absolute 
spiritual  reality,  132;  in 
the  teleological  imity  of 
the  world,  166;  in  the  pos- 
sibility of  a  universal  social 
life,  197;  as  realized  in  uni- 
versal evolution.  259. 

World:  Of  primitive  human 
thought,  69;  of  the  natural 
man,  109;  of  supernatu- 
ralism, 159;  of  modern 
thought,  231. 


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